THE  INSPIRATION  i 

^■»     ^.^  OF  SCRIPTURE 


Ot 

PRINCETON,    N.    J. 

1 

Shelf. 

Sectmn    V. Jj.oS....... 

Nicttiber 

THE 


iNSPiiiATiON  OF  Holy  Scripture: 


BEING 


AN    ESSAY. 


BY 


RT.  REV.  EDWARD  HAROLD 'BROWNE,  D.D., 


A    PORTIOlSr    OF    AI^    ESSAY, 


BY 


RT.  REV.  CHAS.  JOHN  ELLICOTT,  D.D. 


PRINTED  FOR  THE  PROTESTANT  EPISCOPAL  SOCIETY  FOR  THE 
PROMOTION  OF  EVANGELICAL  KNOWLEDGE. 


NEW  YORK: 

2  Bible  House. 
1«79. 


[The  followinp^  Essays  were  originally  published  in  a 
series  of  Theological  Essays  entitled,  "  Aids  to  Faith." 


S.   W.   Green, 

Printer, 

16  and  18  Jacob  Street, 

New  York, 


IT^SPIEATIOJN". 


CONTENTS. 


1.  iNTEODtrcTiON— All   Spiritual   enlightenment  derived    from    the 

Divine  Spirit ;  but  is  all  derived  in  the  same  way? 

2.  A  Divine  and  human  element  in  all  inspiration— How  co-existing? 

3.  History  of  the  question— Jewish  opinions— Patristic  opinions. 

4.  No  argument  against  a  high  view  to  be  deduced  from  the  patristic 

belief  in  the  inspiration  of  others  besides  the  Apostles. 

5.  Middle  ages— Mysticism. 

6.  The  Reformation  favorable  to  a  very  high  esteem  of  Holy  Scrip- 

ture, but  favorable  also  to  freedom  of  thought. 

7.  Tendency  of  thought  in  Germany  in  the  eighteenth  century. 

8.  Deism  passed  from  England,  through  France,  to  Germany— Doc- 

trine of  the  English  Deists. 

9.  Causes  leading  to  the  controversy  on  inspiration  in  the  present 

day. 

10.  English  writers  of  the  present  century  and  their  theories. 

11.  Christian  Evidence  in  a  measure  independent  of  theories  of  inspi- 

ration. 

12.  Definite  theories  not  desirable. 

13.  Objections  to  inspiration  closely  connected  with  objections  to  mir- 

acles. 

14.  Origin  of  doubts  about  miracles. 

15.  Miracles  not  improbable,  if  there  be  a  spiritual  world  connected 

more  or  less  closely  with  the  physical  world,  and  a  Personal  Ruler 
of  the  world. 

16.  If  miracles  ever  should  occur,  we  should  most  naturally  expect 

them  to  be  connected  with  some  special  communication  of  God's 
will  to  man. 

17.  The  common  course  taken  by  philosophical  scepticism. 

18.  As  to  inspiration:  we  have  first  certain  phenomena  in  the  Bible, 

proving  the  existence  of  a  human  element— The  manifestation  of 
that  human  element  most  valuable  in  the  matter  of  evidence^ 
We  have  next  certain  phenomena  manifesting  a  Divine  element— 
(a)  Prophecy— Question  as  to  the  existence  of  true  predictive 
prophecy  in  the  Old  Testament— Objection— Nihil  in  scripto  quod 
non  prius  in  Scriptore— Objection  'replied  to— Cases  of  Balaam 
■    and  Caiaphas— (6)  Types. 

19.  How  far  all  this  proves  the  special  inspiration  of  the  Old  Testa- 

ment—Coleridge's view  considered. 

20.  Argument  a  fortiori  for  the  inspiration  of  the  New  Testament— Mr. 

Maurice's  question  replied  to. 

21.  Mr.  Morell's  theory  of  the  intuitional  consciousness  considered. 

22.  Latitude  of  opinion  on  some  points  may  be  allowable. 

23.  The  Scriptures  an  infallible  depository  of  religious  truth. 

24.  Questfon  coHcernlng  physical  science. 

25.  Conclusion— Some  trials  of  our  faith  ought  not  to  stagger  us— The 

proper  condition  of  mind  in  the  present  day. 


OSPIIIATION. 


1.  As  in  the  natural  world  wisdom  and  intel- 
ligence are  among  the  signs  of  life  in  an  intelli- 
gent being,  so  in  the  spiritual  world  a  spiritual 
understanding  follows  on  the  possession  of  spir- 
itual life.  As  the  Divine  Spirit  gives  life,  so 
He  inspires  ^dsdom.  Indeed  all  spiritual  gifts 
flow  equally  from  the  same  Spirit.  St.  Paul 
says  that  ^'  there  are  diversities  of  gifts,  hut 
the  same  Spirit,"  who  gives  to  one  the  word 
of  wisdom,  to  another  the  word  of  knowledge, 
to  another  faith,  to  another  miracles  and  gifts 
of  healing,  to  another  prophecy,  to  another  di- 
vers kinds  of  tongues,  to  another  the  interpre- 
tation of  tongues.  So  he  describes  the  influ- 
ence of  that  one  and  the  self -same  Spirit  on 
the  early  disciples  in  the  Church  of  Corintli. 
Are  we  to  take  this  literally  ?  Are  we  to  be- 
lieve that,  wliilst  some  had  spiritual  Avisdom 


6  mSPIBATTON. 

and  understanding — and  that  in  larger  or  less 
degrees — others  were  enabled  to  work  miracles, 
others  to  proj)hesy  ;  that  whilst  to  some  there 
was  only  the  common  understanding  of  sj^ir- 
itual  truths  and  mysteries,  such  as  an  enlight- 
ened mind  among  ourselves  could  penetrate, 
to  others  there  was  given  an  infallible  knowl- 
edge of  future  events  or  of  Divine  truths 
otherwise  unknown  to  man  ?  Or,  on  the  other 
hand,  shall  we  think  no  more  than  this — that 
the  Holy  S]3irit,  who  is  the  inspirer  of  all  wis- 
dom, by  regenerating  the  heart,  purifying  the 
soul,  exalting  the  affections,  and  quickening 
the  intuitions  of  the  mind,  gives  to  some  men 
more  than  to  others  an  insight  into  things 
heavenly,  and  so  enables  them  in  all  times  and 
in  all  ages  of  the  Church  to  be  exponents  of  the 
Divine  will  ? — that  He  reveals  God  and  Christ 
in  their  inmost  consciences,  inspiring  them 
with  all  high  and  holy  thoughts,  and  that  thus 
they  can  utter  things  which  would  be  deep 
mysteries  to  other  men,  and  which  are,  indeed, 
the  oracles  of  God  ? 

2.  This  is  pretty  much  the  question  con- 
cerning inspiration  so  much  agitated  now. 
When  welcome  to  consider  it,  there  can  be  no 
doubt  but  that  we  must  admit  a  human  and  a 
Divine  element.     There  is  the  mind  of  the 


INSPIRATION.  7 

Prophet  or  Apostle  to  be  enlightened,  and 
the  Holy  Spirit,  the  inspirer  or  enlightener. 
The  qnestion  will  be,  in  what  manner  and  in 
what  proj^ortion  these  two  elements  coexist. 
We  may  suppose  the  human  mind  perfectly 
passive,  acting  simply  under  a  mechanical  in- 
fluence of  the  Holy  Spirit,  speaking  or  writing 
not  its  own  thoughts  or  its  own  words,  but 
only  the  thoughts  and  words  of  the  Sj)irit 
of  God.  Or  we  may  suppose  the  mind  of 
the  writer  or  speaker  acting  altogether  freely, 
speaking  entirely  its  own  thoughts  and  words, 
but  having  derived  from  Divine  communion 
and  enlightenment  a  liigher  tone,  having  ac- 
quired a  correcter  judgment,  and,  from  a 
deep  spiritual  insight,  able  to  speak  spiritual 
things  such  as  the  natural  man  receiveth  not. 
These  are  the  two  extremes.  The  one  is  ver- 
bal inspiration,  simple  dictation,  so  that  the 
lips  of  the  Prophet  and  the  pen  of  the  Evan- 
gelist are  but  mechanical  organs  moved  by  the 
Spirit  of  God.  The  other  is  no  more  than  an 
exaltation  of  the  natural  faculties  by  the  influ- 
ence of  the  same  Spirit,  such  an  exaltation  as 
we  must  believe  all  wise  and  holy  men  to  have 
received,  an  inspiration  such  as  that  by  which 
a  Hooker  or  a  Butler  wrote  the  works  which 
bear  their  names.     There  are  many  interme- 


r 


8  INSPIRATION. 

diate  steps  between  tliese  two,  but  no  one  can 
exceed  either  of  these  extremes  and  yet  call 
himself  a  Christian. 

3.  Many  causes  have  brought  this  subject 
into  controversy  at  present.  It  has,  how- 
ever, occupied  the  thoughts  of  thoughtful  men, 
and  has  been  debated  and  disputed  on  in  earlier 
times  ;  and  a  rapid'  glance  at  the  history  of 
the  question  may  be  a  help  to  giving  it  its  true 
place,  and  perhaps  to  finding  its  true  solution. 

The  reverence  which  the  ancient  Jews  felt 
for  the  Jewish  Scriptures  must  have  sprung 
from  the  highest  theory  of  verbal  inspiration. 
Their  care  to  count  every  verse  and  letter  in 
every  book  of  the  Old  Testament,  to  retain 
every  large  or  small  letter,  every  letter  above 
or  below  the  hne,  their  belief  that  a  mystery 
lurked  in  every  abnormal  state  of  letter,  jot, 
or  tittle,  cannot  have  resulted  from  any  lower 
principle.  Later  Jews,  like  the  Cabalists  or 
Maimonides,  may  have  become  Pantheists,  or 
Rationalists  ;  but  the  more  ancient  have  left 
us  the  clearest  proof  that  they  esteemed  the 
Scriptures  as  the  express  word  of  God  Him- 
self. The  well-known  tradition  amongst  the 
Alexandrian  Jews  concerning  the  verbal 
agreement  of  all  the  LXX.  translators,  though 
working  in  seventy  se]3arate  cells,  looks  the 


INSPIRATION.  9 

same  way.  There  is  considerable  reason  to  be- 
lieve that  the  distinction  between  the  differ- 
ent books  of  Scripture — the  Hagiographa  being 
esteemed  inferior  to  the  Prophets,  and  the 
Prophets  inferior  to  the  law — was  at  least 
much  magnified,  if  not  wholly  invented,  by 
the  later  Jews.  So  far,  however,  as  such  a 
distinction  and  such  difference  of  estimation 
existed  at  all,  so  far  we  must  perhaps  believe 
that  there  was  a  notion  of  something  like  de- 
grees of  inspiration. 

The  earlier  Christian  Fathers  seem  to  have 
followed  much  the  same  course  as  their  Jew- 
ish predecessors.  Clemens  Romanus  calls  the 
Holy  Scriptures  ''  the  true  words  of  the  Holy 
Ghost"  (c.  45).  JNo  definite  theory  of  inspi- 
ration would  be  likely  to  be  j)ropounded  ;  but 
the  generaj  reverence  for  the  words  of  Holy 
AVrit,  and  the  deep  significance  believed  to 
exist  underneath  the  letter,  prove  the  belief 
in  inspiration  to  have  been  very  strong  and 
universal.  Justin  Martyr  and  his  Jewish  op- 
ponent seem  fully  agreed  in  tlieir  apprecia- 
tion of  the  Old  Testament.  ''No  Scripture 
can  be  opposed  to  any  other  Scripture. ' '  ('  Di- 
alog.'  p.  289.)  Irenjeus  saw  in  our  Lord's 
promise  to  his  Apostles — "  He  that  lieareth 
you,  heareth  Me"  (Luke  x.  16) — an  assurance 


10  INSPIRATION. 

of  their  infallibility  in  the  Gospel.  "  After 
the  Lord's  resurrection  they  were  indued  with 
the  power  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  had  per- 
fect knowledge  of  the  truth.  He,  therefore, 
who  despises  their  teaching  despises  Christ  and 
God. ' '  (Iren.  iii.  1.)  Still  it  may  be  fairly  said 
that  Iren^ens,  in  his  accounts  of  the  composi- 
tion of  the  Gospel,  seems  to  combine  a  human 
element  with  the  Divine.     (See  Iren.  iii.  11.) 

Tertullian  embraced  the  Montanist  belief, 
that  Divine  communications  were  made  to 
man  by  means  of  a  condition  of  trance  or  ec- 
stasy. In  this  trance  the  prophet  was  sup- 
posed to  lose  all  sense,  like  a  Pythoness  under 
the  influence  of  the  Divine  afflatus,  (c.  Mar- 
cion.  iv.  22.)  This  was  the  highest  kind  of 
inspiration.  Yet  he  seems  to  have  thought 
that  the  Apostles  were  at  times  allowed  to 
speak  their  own  words,  and  not  the  words  of 
God,  as  where  St.  Paul  (1  Cor.  vii.  12)  says, 
''  To  the  rest  speak  I,  not  the  Lord."  ('  De 
Monogam.'  c.  3.) 

The  Alexandrian  Fathers,  Clement  and 
Origen,  though  adopting  somewhat  of  the 
ISTeo-Platonic  views  of  the  soul,  as  receiving 
an  enlightenment  by  communion  with  the  Di- 
vine Logos,  appear  to  have  held  firmly  the  in- 
fallibility of  every  word  of  Scripture  ;  and  the 


INSPIRATION.  11 

Mystical  sense  wliicli  tliey  attacli  to  the  his- 
tory and  the  language  of  the  Old  Testament 
seems  to  point  even  to  verbal  inspiration. 
(See  Lnmper,  '  Historia  Theologico-critica, ' 
vol.  9.  c.  4.  §  iii.  art.  2.)  Origen  was,  how- 
ever, the  first  great  Biblical  critic  :  few  things 
have  tended  more  than  Biblical  criticism  to 
modify  the  theory  of  verbal  inspiration  :  and 
this  appeared  even  in  the  jDatristic  ages  and 
among  some  of  the  most  illnstrions  of  the 
patristic  writers.  The  critical  labors  of  Cliry- 
sostom  and  Jerome,  in  tlie  beginning  of  the 
fifth  centnry,  made  them  f)bserve  the  apparent 
discrepancies  in  the  account  of  the  Evangel- 
ists, and  other  like  difiicnlties  in  Holv  Writ. 
Such  observations  led  to  a  greater  appreciation 
of  the  human  element  in  the  composition  of 
Scripture.  St.  Clnysostom  could  see  that  some 
slight  variations  in  the  different  narratives  of  i^ 
the  same  event  were  no  cause  for  anxiety  or 
unbelief,  but  rather  a  j^roof  that  the  Evangelists 
were  independent  witnesses.  And  St.  Jer- 
ome could  discern  in  the  ]^ew  Testament  writ- 
ers a  dialect  inferior  to  the  purest  Greek,  and 
even  at  times  a  mixture  of  human  passion  in 
the   language   of    the    Apostles."     All    this, 

*  Neander,  '  History  of  Doctrines,'  i.  280.     (Bohn.) 


12  INSPIRATION. 

• 

however,  these  Fathers  clearly  held  to  be  sub- 
jected and  subordinate  to  the  general  Divine 
influence  of  the  guiding  and  overruling  Spirit. 
4.  No  argnment  against  a  high  doctrine  of 
inspiration,  as  held  by  the  Fathers,  can  be 
fairly  deduced  from  the  fact  that  they  were 
disposed  to  admit  the  inspiration  of  other 
writings  besides  the  Canonical  Scriptures. 
Many  of  them  knew  the  Old  Testament  only 
in  the  Greek  translation,  and  were  inclined  to 
pay  the  same  reverence  to  that  which  may 
have  been  due  only  to  the  Hebrew  original. 
The  writings  of  Clement  and  Hermas  were  at 
first  received  as  canonical,  though  more  care- 
ful inquiry  excluded  them  from  the  Canon  of 
the  !New  Testament.  This  may  be  an  argu- 
ment against  the  criticaLaccnracy  of  the  Fath- 
ers, but  is  none  against  their  belief  in  the  in- 
spiration of  the  Bible.  Nor,  again,  are  we 
warranted  in  thinking  that  they  confounded 
natural  enlightenment  with  spiritual  inspira- 
tion, because  some  of  them  speak  as  if  pro- 
phetic powers  and  supernatural  illumination 
were  vouchsafed  to  others  besides  the  Apostles 
of  Christ.  There  can  be  no  question  that  the 
earlier  Fathers  believed  in  the  continuation  of 
the  miraculous  powers  of  the  Apostolic  age 
down   to   their   own   times,    and   hence  they 


INSPIRATION.  18 

looked  themselves  for  a  special  illumination 
from  the  Holy  Ghost.  Yet,  even  so,  they  dis- 
tinguished carefully  between  the  gift  of  infal- 
libility in  things  spiritual  vouchsafed  to  the 
writers  of  the  Xew  Testament,  and  the  gift 
of  Divine  illumination  to  themselves  and  their 
own  contemjDoraries.* 

5.  The  Church  of  the  middle  ages  had,  for 
the  most  part,  a  belief  similar  to  that  of  the 
earlier  Fathers.  Visions,  and  dreams,  and 
sensil)le  illuminations  were  still  expected. 
Miraculous  powers  and  Divine  inspiration  were 
still  Ijelieved  to  reside  in  the  Church  ;  but  the 
Scriptures  were  not  the  less  esteemed  as  spe- 
cially, and  in  a  sense  distinct  and  peculiar,  the 
lively  oracles  of  God.  Still  the  bold  specula- 
tions   of    Abelard,    in    the    twelfth   century, 

*  Ignatius  claims  for  himself  that  he  knew  the  doc- 
trines which  he  taught,  not  from  man,  but  from  the  tes- 
timony of  the  Spirit  ('  ad  Philadelph.'  7)  ;  but  then  he 
clearly  distinguishes  between  himself  and  the  Apostles. 
"I  do  not  enjoin  you  as  Peter  and  Paul  ;  they  were 
Apostles,  I  a  condemned  man."  ('  Ad.  Eph. '  15.)  And 
Tertullian,  who  took  a  peculiarly  high  view  of  the 
Divine  illumination  of  the  true  Christian,  says  distinctly 
that  "  all  the  faithful  have  the  Spirit  of  God,  but  all  are 
not  Apostles."  "  The  Apostles  have  the  floly  Spirit  in 
a  peculiar  sense."  (' De  Exhortatione  Castitatis,'  4.) 
See  Westcott,  *  Introd.  to  the  Gospels, '  pp.  386,  400. 


14  INSPIRATION. 

reached  the  doctrine  of  inspiration  as  well  as 
other  deep  questions  of  theology.  The  Proph- 
ets, as  he  taught,  had  sometimes  the  gift  of 
prophecy  and  sometimes  spoke  from  their  own 
minds.  The  Apostles  too  were  liable  to  error, 
as  St.  Peter  on  the  question  of  circumcision, 
who  was  reproved  by  St.  Paul.*  Abelard's 
tendency  was  rationalistic.  But  here  a  very 
important  phenomenon,  not  confined  to  the 
middle  ages,  but  very  apparent  then,  deserves 
our  careful  attention.  In  all  ages  of  the 
Church  we  find  frequent  tendencies  to  mysti- 
cism. The  desire  for  a  kind  of  ecstatic  vision 
of  things  Divine,  of  abstraction  from  the  ex-, 
ternal  world,  and  an  absorbed  contemplation 
of  the  Deity,  is  natural  to  enthusiastic  tem- 
peraments, and  is  not  uncommon  in  times  of 
dogmatic  controversy.  .The  state  so  sought 
after  seems  to  offer  a  refuge  from  the  strife  of 
tongues,  from  the  din  and  noise  and  unchari- 
tableness  of  the  world  and  the  Church  with- 
out. Those  who  have  taken  this  line,  indulged 
in  this  spirit,  have,  of  course,  a  firm  belief  in 
the  communion  of  the  Christian  soul  with  the 
Spirit  of  God,  and  look  for  constant  re  vela - 

*  '  Sic  et  Non. '    Ed.  Hencke,  p.  10.     See  Neander, 
'  Hist,  of  Doctrine,'  vol.'ii.  p.  492. 


INSPIRATION.  15 

tions  from  tlie  Divaiie  to  tlie  human  intelli- 
gence. The  mystic  is  transported  out  of  self, 
and  aims  at  frequent  supernatural  communion 
with  God.  To  such  a  person  the  condition  of 
the  devout  soul  is  a  condition  of  constant  in- 
spiration. It  is  very  true  that  the  Holy  Spirit 
is  ever  present  with  the  Church,  ever  dwells 
in  the  souls  of  Christians,  is  our  teacher  and 
guide  in  all  things,  is  ever  ready  to  enlighten 
our  understandings,  as  well  as  to  convert  our 
hearts.  But  this  truth  of  Scripture,  pressed  to 
the  extent  of  mysticism,  breaks  down  the 
boundary  between  the  insj^iration  of  Prophets 
or  Apostles,  and  the  enlightenment  of  the 
Christian  soul.  The  genuine  mystic  is  himself 
in  a  state  of  the  highest  inspiration.  The  intu- 
itions of  his  spirit  enable  him  to  see  things  in- 
visible. High  doctrine  concerning  the  Church 
is  favorable  enough  to  such  a  view  of  things. 
Belief  in  the  infallibility  of  the  existing 
Church,  in  its  miraculous  powers,  and  in  fre- 
(pient  revelations  to  the  higher  Saints,  looked 
all  this  way.  Again,  it  is  well  known  how 
mysticism  tended  to  Pantheism.  Striving 
after  absorption  in  God,  men  learned  to  iden- 
tify their  own  minds,  more  or  less,  with 
Deity.  The  Divine  Spirit  was  believed  to 
dwell  in  all  human  souls,  and  needed  only  to 


1 6  INSPIEA  TION, 

be  stirred  up  within  tliem.  The  inclination  to 
look  wholly  within,  neglect  of  the  objective, 
cultivation  only  of  the  subjective — all  this  too 
readily  takes  a  pantheistic  direction.  And  so 
we  find  many  sects  of  medieval  mystics  lapsing 
at  length  into  pure  Pantheism — a  state  of  be- 
lief in  w^hicli  it  is  plain  enough  that  anything 
like  the  Christian  doctrine  of  the  inspiration 
of  the  Scriptures  is  impossible,  as  it  cannot  be 
distinguished  from  the  illumination  of  any  de- 
vout mind,  or  from  the  inspirations  of  genius. 
This  is  a  thing  of  great  importance  to  observe, 
as  it  shows  itself  in  subsequent  ages  of  Church 
History.  Mysticism  and  extreme  spiritualism 
destroy  any  definite  doctrine  of  the  inspiration 
of  Scripture,  and  they  very  readily  glide  into 
Pantheism. 

6.  The  Reformation,  of  course,  introduced 
much  thought  and  controversy  about  Scrip- 
ture. ^'  The  sufficiency  of  the  Scriptures  for 
salvation"  became  a  Peformation  watchword  : 
Scripture,  the  written  word  of  God, — not  the 
unwritten  record  of  the  Church,  Tradition. 
The  natural  inclination  was  to  a  very  high  es- 
teem of  the  Bible,  as  the  definite  deposit  of 
Christian  truth,  in  contradistinction  to  the  in- 
definiteness  of  the  traditions  of  the  Church,  and 
of  that  teaching  of  the  Holy  Spirit  ever  pres- 


INSPIRATION.  17 

ent  with  the  Clmrch,  on  which  the  Roman  di- 
vines insisted.  IS'evei'theless,  the  tendency  of 
the  Reformation  was  to  boldness  of  thought 
and  freedom  of  inquiry.  Erasmus,  the  great 
forerunner  of  Luther,  had  from  liis  critical 
investigations  been  led  to  a  somewhat  freer 
view  of  inspiration  than  had  been  common  be- 
fore him.  He  thought  it  unnecessary  to  attrib- 
ute everything  in  the  Apostles  to  miraculous 
teaching.  Christ  suffered  the  Apostles  to  err, 
and  that  too  after  the  descent  of  the  Paraclete, 
but  not  so  as  to  endanger  the  faith.*  Even 
Luther,  the  great  master  mind  of  the  age, 
w^ith  his  strong  subjective  tendency,  and  with 
his  indomitable  boldness,  ventured  to  subject 
the  books  of  the  New  Testament  to  the  crite- 
rion of  his  own  intuition.  The  teaching  of 
St.  Paul  penetrated  and  convinced  his  soul  ; 
St.  James  seemed  to  contradict  St.  Paul  ;  and 
his  Epistle  was  rejected  as  an  Epistle  of  straw. 
There  is  reason  to  believe  that  he  afterwards 
regretted  and  retracted  ;  but  words  once  spo- 

*  Non  est  oecesse  ut  quicquid  fuit  in  Apostolis  pro- 
tinus  ad  miraculum  vocemus.  Passus  est  errare  suos 
Cliristus,  etiam  post  acceptiim  Paracletum,  sed  non 
usque  ad  fidei  periculum. — Erasm.  Epistt,  lib.  ii.  toni. 
iv.  Edit.  Basil. 
2 


18  INSPIRATION. 

ken  reach  far  and  wide,  and  can  never  be  un- 
said again. 

The  tendency  of  Calvin  and  the  Calvin- 
ist  reformers  was  less  subjective  and  more 
scholastic  than  that  of  Luther  and  the  Luther- 
ans. Their  distinct  and  definite  system  of 
doctrine,  Kke  that  of  their  forerunners  Augus- 
tine and  Aquinas,  naturally  found  a  place  for 
the  plenary  and  even  verbal  inspiration  of  the 
ScrijDtures,  so  that  some  of  the  Swiss  Confes- 
sions speak  of  simple  dictation  by  the  Holy 
Ghost.  The  Remonstrants  or  Arminians,  on 
the  other  hand,  were  more  disposed  to  Ration- 
alism than  the  generality  of  the  reformed  ;  and 
writers,  like  Grotius  and  Episcopius,  made 
clear  distinctions  between  the  Divine  and  the 
human  element  in  the  writers  of  the  Old  and 
New  Testaments.* 

The  Socinians  were,  of  course,  the  most  ra- 
tionalizing sect  of  those  which  early  sj^rang 
from  the  Reformation,  a  fungus-growth,  rath- 
er than  one  of  the  natural  branches.  At 
first,  however,  they  took  the  same  view  as 
other  Protestant  writers  of  the  authority  of 
Holy  Writ,  only  they  were  less  sensitive  about 

*  E.g.  A  Spiritu  Sancto  dictari  historias  non  full  opus. 
Satis  fuit  scriptorem  memoria  valere. — Grotius,  Vot. 
pro  pace  JSccles. ,  torn.  iii.  p.  672.     Lond.  1679. 


INSPIRATION.  19 

difficulties  and  apparent  discrepancies  in  Scrip- 
ture, and  more  dis])Osed  to  cut  and  square  it 
so  as  to  accord  with  what  appeared  to  tlieni  to 
be  reason  and  common -sense.  This  tendency 
more  and  more  fully  developed  itself.  The 
modern  Unitarian  is  a  genuine  Rationalist, 
often  little  different  from  a  Deist. 

The  mystical  spirit,  which  had  long  been 
swelling  up  under  the  weight  of  the  Medieval 
Church,  sometimes  wholly  within  it,  some- 
times bursting  forth  from  the  pressure,  showed 
itself  in  many  places  and  many  forms,  after 
the  triumph  of  the  Reformation.  Its  eleva- 
tion of  the  subjective  over  the  objective,  of 
the  inward  life  over  the  outward  letter,  led  in- 
sensibly to  a  disregard  of  the  Bible  in  compar- 
ison with  the  internal  testimony  and  the  intui- 
tion of  the  soul.  The  Anabaptists  of  Germany 
were  of  the  coarsest  class  of  mystics.  Among 
the  best  have  been  the  Quakers  in  this  coun- 
try. The  leading  j^rinciple  of  George  Fox, 
their  founder,  was  the  doctrine  of  the  Inward 
Light.  This  is  the  true  principle  of  all  knowl- 
edge of  religion.  The  outward  Word  is 
chiefly  valuable  as  it  stirs  up  the  Word  within. 
The  highest  source  of  knowledge  is  this  inward 
illumination.  All  outward  forms,  all  outward 
tests,  all  creeds  and  confessions,  are  strict!  v 


20  INSPIRATION. 

forbidden.  Even  the  Bible  must  be  subordi- 
nated to  tlie  light  of  God  within.  It  is  evident 
that,  on  this  princijDle,  there  can  be  no  distinc- 
tion between  the  inspiration  of  Prophets  and 
Apostles  and  the  inspiration  of  every  devont 
soul.  It  is  also  observable  how  this  theory 
produces  results  like  those  which  s^^ring  from 
the  Koman  doctrine  of  tradition.  The  written 
Word  of  God  is  no  longer  the  final  court  of 
appeal  in  controversies  of  doctrine.  The 
Church  of  Rome  finds  an  infallible  interpreter" 
in  that  Divine  Spirit  which  ever  dwells  in  and 
guides  the  Church.  The  mystic  has  an  infal- 
lible interpreter  in  his  own  bosom,  who  not 
only  opens  his  understanding  that  he  may  un- 
derstand the  Scriptures,  but  communicates  di- 
rectly and  sensibly  truth  to  the  soul.  It  is 
also  very  deserving  of  remark,  however  pain- 
ful it  may  be,  that  at  one  time  the  Quakers 
were  rapidly  hurrying  into  Kationalism,  and 
even  Socinianism — the  coldest  forms  of  un- 
belief— from  the  warm  mysticism  of  their  first 
founders. 

1.  To  come  nearer  to  our  own  times,  the 
whole  spirit  of  the  last  century  in  Germany  was 
subjective.  There  seemed  a  reaction  from  the 
positive  spirit  of  the  seventeenth  century, 
which  has  been  called  the  middle  age  of  the 


INSPIRATION.  21 

Reformation.  Pietism  was  the  form  takea 
by  the  ]*eligious  revival,  a  form  which  was 
eminently  subjective,  and  which  jDartook  much 
of  the  mystical.  The  philosophical  spirit  was 
of  the  same  character.  The  very  principle  of 
illuminism  (anfklariing)  was,  that  there  is  in 
man's,  inmost  consciousness  an  intuitional 
knowledge  of  truth.  Its  motto — "  Wahr  ist 
was  klar  ist,"  '' fhat  is  true  wiiich  is  clear" 
— sufficiently  indicates  its  character.  Proceed- 
ing from  such  a  ground,  and  raising  Natural 
Peligion  to  the  rank  of  a  Kevelation,  Tullner, 
the  disciple  of  Wolif ,  reduced  Scripture  to  the 
level  of  a  natural  light.*  At  the  same  time, 
the  Pietists  used  the  Bible,  not  so  much  to  be 
the  source  of  truth  and  the  fountain  of  faith, 
as  for  a  book  of  devotion  and  to  raise  pious 
emotions,  t  In  both  ways  there  was  a  move 
towards  the  confounding  of  the  light  of  Na- 
ture with  the  light  of  Kevelation,  of  the  light 
of  the  Spirit  in  the  devout  or  illuminated  soul 
with  the  light  which  had  been  specially  voucli- 
safed  to  Prophets  and  Apostles  for  communi- 
cating God's  truth  to  the  w^orld. 

8.  In  the  latter  half  of  the  eigliteenth  cen- 

*  See  Kahnis,  '  Hist,  of  German  Protestantism,'  Eng- 
lish Translation,  by  Meyer,  p.  110. 
t  II).,  pp.  100,  110. 


22  INBPIRATION. 

tury,  the  Deism  wliicli  had  been  troubhng 
England  had  passed  through  the  alembic  of 
French  scepticism,  and  now  settled  down  in  a 
shower  of  Rationalism  on  Germany.  The  Ra- 
tionalism of  Panlus,  the  Pantheism  of  Hegel, 
the  historical  myth  of  Stranss,  derive  their 
pedigree  from  the  writings  of  Lord  Herbert  of 
Cherbnry,  Toland,  Tindall,  and  other  Eng- 
lish Deists  of  the  seventeenth  and  early  eigh- 
teenth centuries,  through  the  school  of  Rous- 
seau and  Yoltaire.^  The  special  principle  of 
Lord  Herbert  and  his  followers,  the  Deists, 
was  that  there  were  several  positive  religions — 
Christianity,  Judaism,  Mohammedanism,  etc. 
In  the  main  all  these  are  the  same.  The  gen- 
eral religion  is  at  the  bottom  of  all  of  them, 
i.  e. ,  the  Religion  of  ^Nature,  a  religion  founded 
in  the  natural  j)erception  of  truth,  the  intui- 
tional consciousness  of  the  human  mind.  Posi- 
tive religions  may  be  very  good  for  practical 
purposes  ;  but  all  that  is  positive  in  them  is 
evil,  or  at  the  best  worthless  ;  the  valuable  part 
being  that  which  they  hold  in  common  of  the 
general  religion.  It  was  this  principle  which 
passed  through  the  various  forms  of  French 
infidelity,   German  Rationahsm   and  Panthe- 

*  See  Kahnis  as  above,  p.  31,  etc,    McCaul's  '  Ration- 
alism and  Deistic  Infidelity, '  passim. 


INSPIRATION.  23 

ism,  and  wliicli  has  been  brought  back  to  us, 
as  the  highest  result  of  modern  discoveries  in 
science  and  mental  philosophy.  How  it  was 
calculated  to  act  upon  the  theory  of  inspira- 
tion, and  to  unsettle  it  even  with  those  who 
had  not  become  either  Rationalists  or  Deists,  it 
is  needless  to  remark.  Where  a  shadow  of  in- 
fidelity is  obscuring  the  light,  many,  who  are 
not  wholly  under  its  darkness,  w^ill  yet  pass 
through  the  penumbra  that  surrounds  it.  E  ven 
the  apologist  in  the  last  century,  from  the  wish 
to  take  positions  which  were  im^^regnable,  sur- 
rendered, at  least  for  argument's  sake,  the 
higher  ground  of  their  forerunners  in  the 
faith.  And,  in  the  like  manner,  among  the 
German  divines,  who  still  held  Christian  and 
orthodox  opinions,  there  was  a  tendency  to  de- 
part from  the  higher  doctrine  of  inspiration 
held  by  the  Church  and  the  Reformers  ;  to 
speak  of  degrees  of  inspiration,  of  falhl)ility 
in  things  earthly,  of  a  Divine  influence  elevat- 
ing the  mental  faculties  of  the  sacred  writers  ; 
not  simply  to  ascribe  all  to  the  direct  teaching 
of  the  Spirit  of  God.* 

9.  Distinct  theories  of  inspiration  were  in 
old    times   seldom    propounded,   even    where 

*  See  Kahnis,  pp.  116,  117. 


24  INSPIRATION. 

some  attention  was  directed  to  the  question. 
Definite  controversies  upon  it  scarcely  arose. 
The  present  century  has  been  rife  in  both  ; 
and  they  have  prevailed  not  a  little  among 
ourselves.  Several  causes  have  contributed  to 
call  them  forth.  First,  and  chiefly,  the  sj)read 
of  rationalizing  speculations,  and  the  conse- 
quent unsettling  of  faith.*  Next,  the  greater 
attention  which  has  been  paid  to  the  criticism 
of  the  Bible,  and  especially  of  the  ]N"ew  Testa- 
ment, has  exposed  to  view  some  of  the  difficul- 
ties concerning  the  origin  of  the  books  of  the 
Bible,  concerning  the  historical  accuracy  of 
some  statements,  concerning  the  slight  a]3par- 
ent  variations  in  the  testimony  of  the  Evangel- 
ists. In  ordinary  historians  these  would  Jpuz- 
zle  no  one.  The  strictest  integrity  is  conqDati- 
ble  with  slight  inaccuracy  or  divergence  of 
testimony  ;  but  if  all  was  the  work  of  God's 
Holy  Spirit,  speaking  through  human  agents, 
the  least  discrepancy  is  formidable.     Hence  the 

*  It  is  important  to  ol3serve,  that  tliis  was  first  in 
time  as  well  as  in  importance.  Dr.  McCaul  has  shown 
clearly  ('  Kationalism  and  Deistic  Infidelity  ')  that  the 
spread  of  unbelieving  opinions  in  Germany  was  first,  the 
^  ,  criticism  came  afterwards.  Faith  in  Revelation  was 
shaken  by  Deism  and  Rationalism,  and  then  the  un- 
friendly criticism  was  brought  to  bear  upon  the  records 
of  Christianity. 


INSPIRATION.  25 

human  element  has  been  thought  more  of 
among  modern  critics,  and  by  some  has  been 
elevated  above  the  Divine.  Thirdly,  the  rapid 
discoveries  of  modern  science  have  been  sup- 
posed to  contradict  the  records  of  the  Old  Tes- 
tament Scriptures  ;  and,  in  order  to  account 
for  such  a  contradiction,  efforts  have  been 
made  to  interpret  anew  the  words  of  Moses  ; 
and,  where  these  have  proved  unsatisfactory, 
many  have  more  or  less  believed  that  the  writ- 
ers of  the  historical  books  were  merely  chron- 
iclers of  historical  events  or  collectors  of  an- 
cient records,  the  providence  of  God  having 
watched  over  the  preservation  of  such  records, 
but  the  Spirit  of  God  having  in  no  sense  dic- 
tated them.  Still  freer  views  have  been  pro- 
pounded ;  but  this  may  suffice  as  the  expres- 
sion of  the  thoughts  of  serious  men. 

10.  One  of  the  Urst  among  ourselves  to  put 
forth  a  bold  theory  of  inspiration  was  Cole- 
ridge. Ilis  '  Confessions  of  an  Enquiring 
Spirit '  was  indeed  not  published  till  after  his 
death  ;  but  the  tone  of  many  former  writings 
is  much  the  same.  In  the  posthumous  work 
just  mentioned  he  unfolds  his  theory  pretty 
freely.  Of  the  Bible  he  speaks  as  a  library  of 
infinite  value,  as  that  which  must  have  a 
Divine  Spirit  in  it,  from  its  appeal  to  all  the 


26  INSPIRATION. 

hidden  springs  of  feeling  in  our  hearts.  ''  In 
shoi-t,"  he  writes,  ''  whatever  fiiuls  me  bears 
witness  that  it  has  j)roceeded  from  a  Holy 
Spirit."  (Letter  i.)  '^  In  the  Bible  there  is 
more  that  finds  me  than  I  have  exj)erienced 
in  all  other  books  put  together  ;  the  words  of 
the  Bible  find  me  at  greater  de^^ths  of  my 
being  ;  and  whatever  finds  me  brings  with  it  an 
irresistible  evidence  of  its  having  proceeded 
from  the  Holy  Spirit."  (Letter  ii.)  But 
then  he  protests  against  ' '  the  doctrine  which 
requires  me  to  believe  that  not  only  what 
finds  me,  but  all  that  exists  in  the  sacred  vol- 
ume, and  which  I  am  bound  to  find  therein, 
was  not  only  inspired  by,  that  is,  composed 
by  men  under  the  actuating  influence  of,  the 
Holy  Spirit,  but  likewise  dictated  by  an  In- 
fallible Intelligence  ;  that  the  writers,  each 
and  all,  were  divinely  informed,  as  well  as 
inspired."  The  very  essence  of  this  '^doc- 
trine is  this,  that  one  and  the  same  Intelligence 
is  speaking  in  the  unity  of  a  person,  which 
unity  is  no  more  broken  by  the  diversity  of 
the  pipes  through  which  it  makes  itself  audi- 
ble, than  is  a  tune  by  the  difiPerent  instruments 
on  which  it  is  j)layed  by  a  consummate  musi- 
cian equally  jDerfect  in  all.  One  instrument 
may  be  more  capacious  than  another,  but  as 


INSPIRATION.  27 

far  as  its  compass  extends,  and  in  what  it 
sound>s  forth,  it  will  be  trne  to  the  conception 
of  tlie  master. ' '  Such  a  doctrine,  he  conceives, 
must  imply  infallil)ility  in  physical  science 
and  in  everything  else  as  much  as  in  faith,  in 
things  natural  no  less  than  in  spiritual.  He 
expresses  a  full  belief  ''  that  the  word  of  the 
Lord  came  to  Samuel,  to  Isaiah,  to  others,  and 
that  the  words  which  gave  utterance  to  the 
same  are  faithfully  recorded."  But  for  the 
recording  he  does  not  think  that  there  was  need 
of  any  supernatural  working,  excej)t  in  such 
cases  as  those  in  which  God  not  only  utters  cer- 
tain exj^ress  words  to  a  prophet,  but  also  enjoins 
him  to  record  them.  In  the  latter  case  he  ac- 
cepts them  ''  as  supernaturally  communicated 
and  their  recording  as  executed  under  special 
guidance."  The  arguments  of  Coleridge  are 
calculated  rather  to  pull  down  than  to  build 
up.  He  brings  many  reasons  against  a  rigid 
mechanical  theory,  against  a  belief  that  the 
Bil)le  is  simply  the  voice  of  God's  Holy  Spirit 
uttered  through  different  organs  or  instru- 
ments ;  but  he  does  not  fix  any  limit,  he  does 
not  say  how  far  he  admits  Divine  teaching 
or  inspiration  to  extend,  nor  does  he  apparently 
draw  any  line  of  distinction  between  the  in- 
spiration of  Holy  men  of  old  and  the  8])iritual 


28  INSPIRATION 

and  providential  direction  of  enlightened  men 
in  every  age  and  nation. 

Wherever  Coleridge  has  trodden  Mr.  Man- 
rice  follows  him  ;  not  that  he  is  a  servile  im- 
itator, bnt  he  is  a  zealons  disciple,    and  one 
who   generally   outdoes    his   master.     In   his 
^  Theological  Essays  '  he  begins  to  speak  of 
the  inspiration  of  poets  and  projDliets  among 
the  Greeks  ;  he  sj^eaks  again  of  the  quickening 
and  informing  spirit,   to  which  all  good  men 
ascribe  their  own  teaching  and  enhghtenment  ; 
he  quotes  the  language  of  our  Liturgy  as  as- 
scribing  to  "  God's  holy  inspiration"  the  jDOwer 
of   "thinking  those    things  that   be  good;" 
and  then  he  asks  the  question,  ''  Ought  we  in 
our  sermons  to  say,  '  Brethren,  we  beseech  you 
not  to  suppose  the  inspiration  of  Scripture  to 
at  all  resemble  that  for  which  we  have  been 
praying  ;    they  are  generically  and  essentially 
unlike  ;  it  is  blasj)hemous  to  connect  them  in 
our  minds  ;    the  Church   is   very    guilty   for 
having  suggested    the    association  '  ?"      Pro- 
ceeding in  this  course  he  naturally  arrives  at 
the   conclusion   that   all   which    is   good   and 
beautiful   comes  from  the  inspiration  of  the 
Spirit  of  God,  and  that  the  sacred  words  of 
Scripture  came  in  the  same  manner  from  the 
same  S23irit.     (See  Essay  xiii.)     In  some  of  his 


INSPIRATION.  29 

writings,  especially  in  liis  work  on  '  Sacriiices, ' 
he  appears  to  have  carried  his  disbelief  of  a 
more  special  inspiration  of  Holy  Scripture  to  a 
greater  length  than  in  his  '  Theological  Es- 
says,' as  where  God's  tempting  of  Abraham 
to  slay  his  son  is  attributed  to  a  horrible 
thought  coming  over  him  and  haunting  him. 

A  very  able  and  interesting  writer  on  the 
same  side  of  the  same  subject  is  Mr.  Morell 
in  his  '  Philosophy  of  Keligion. '  The  work  is 
one  of  considerable  acuteness  and  philosophical 
power.  The  writer's  theory  of  inspiration  is 
based  on  his  theory  of  tlie  human  mind.  The 
different  powers  of  consciousness  he  classes 
thus  : 

Powers  of  Consciousness .. to  which  correspond.  .Emotions. 

1.  The  Sensational  "  "  The  Instincts. 

2.  The  Perceptive  "  ''  The   Animal    Pas- 

sions. 

3.  The  Logical  "  "  Relational     Emo- 

tions. 

4.  The  Intuitional  "  "  ./Esthetic,     Moral, 

and  Religious 
Emotions. 

Now,  the  intuitional  consciousness,  he  con- 
tends, is  that  which  alone  is  properly  suscep- 
tible of  religious  imjDressions  and  religious 
tniths.  Kevelation  he  considers  to  involve  an 
immediate  intuition  of  Divine  reahties.  All 
revelation  imj^lies  an  intelhgible  object  pre- 
sented, and  a  given  power  of  recipiency  in  the 


r 


30  INSPIRATION. 

subject,  which  power  is  lodged  in  the  intui- 
tional consciousness.  In  distinguishing  reve- 
lation and  inspiration,  he  defines  '^  revela- 
tion, in  the  Christian  sense,  as  that  act  of  the 
Divine  power  by  which  God  presents  the  re- 
alities of  the  spiritual  world  immediately  to 
the  human  mind,  while  inspiration  denotes 
that  especial  infi.uence  wrought  upon  the  facul 
ties  of  the  subject,  by  virtue  of  which  he  is  able 
to  grasp  these  realities  in  their  perfect  fulness 
and  integrity"  (p.  150).  '^  God  made  a  reve- 
lation of  Himself  to  the  world  in  Jesus  Christ  ; 
but  it  was  the  inspiration  of  the  Apostles, 
which  enabled  them  clearly  to  discern  it." 

Mr.  Morell  argues  that  ^'  the  canonicity  of 
the  New  Testament  Scriptures  was  decided 
upon  solely  on  the  ground  of  their  presenting 
to  the  whole  Church  clear  statements  of  Ajjos- 
tolical  Christianity.  The  idea  of  their  being 
written  by  any  special  command  of  God,  or  ver- 
bal dictation  of  the  Spirit,  was  an  idea  al- 
together foreign  to  the  primitive  Christians" 
(p.  165).  "  The  proper  idea  of  inspiration,  as 
applied  to  the  Holy  Scrij)tures,  does  not  include 
either  miraculous  powers,  verbal  dictation,  or 
any  distinct  commission  from  God. ' '  {Ih. )  On 
the  contrary,  it  consists  ^'  in  the  impartation  of 
clear  intuitions  of  moral  and  spiritual  truth  to 


INSPIRATION.  81 

the  mind  by  extraordinary  means.  According 
to  this  yiew  of  the  case,  inspiration,  as  an  in- 
ternal phenomenon^  is  perfectly  consistent  witli 
tlie  natural  laws  of  the  human  mind — it  is  a 
higher  kind  of  potency,  which  every  man  to 
a  certain  degree  possesses"  (j3.  166).  This 
view,  he  thinks,  "  gives  full  consistency  to  the 
progressive  character  of  Scripture  morality" 
(p.  167).  ''  It  gives  a  satisfactory  explanation 
of  the  minor  discrepancies  to  be  found  in  the 
sacred  writers"  (p.  170),  whether  those  dis- 
crepancies be  between  Scripture  and  science, 
or  in  statements  of  facts,  or  in  reasoning.  In 
every  case  in  which  the  moral  nature  is  highly 
})urified,  and  so  a  harmony  of  the  spiritual 
l)eing  with  the  mind  of  God  produced,  a  re- 
moval of  all  outward  disturbances  from  the 
heart,  "  what,"  he  asks,  "  is  to  prevent  or  dis- 
turb the  immediate  intuition  of  Divine  things  ? 
'  Blessed  are  the  pure  in  heart,  for  they  shall 
see  God  '  "  (p.  186). 

It  is  clear  that  tliis  theory  makes  great 
purity  of  heart,  or  high  sanctification,  equiva- 
lent to,  or  the  unfailing  instrument  of,  inspi- 
ration. If  one  man  is  a  better  Christian  than 
another,  and  so  has  a  purer  heart,  he  must  l)e 
more  inspired  than  the  other.  Hence,  if  a 
man  of  modern  times  could  be  found  of  a 


S  2  IN8PIBA  TION. 

higher  religions  tone  and  character  than  an 
Apostle,  he  wonld  have  a  higher  intuition  of 
Divine  things,  and  therefore  wonld  know 
Christian  trnth  more  infallibly.  Moreover, 
it  appears  that  tlie  value  of  the  Scriptures  con- 
sists, not  in  their  proceeding  from  any  direct 
command  of  God,  or  from  any  infallible  guid- 
ance of  His  Spirit,  but  in  their  embodying 
the  teaching  and  experience  of  men  whose 
hearts  were  elevated,  and  so  their  understand- 
ings enlightened  ;  to  this  it  being  added,  in 
the  case  of  the  N^ew  Testament,  that  the  wTit- 
ers  were  such  as  were  specially  qualified  to 
represent  the  Apostolical  Church,  and  so  to 
transmit  its  spirit  and  teaching  to  us. 

A  writer  of  less  ability,  but  more  boldness, 
Mr.  MadSTaught  of  Liverpool,  has  carried  the 
same  theory  to  its  furthest  limits.  He  defines 
inspiration  to  be  '^that  action  of  the  Divine 
Spirit  by  which,  apart  from  any  idea  of  infal- 
libility, all  that  is  good  in  man,  beast,  or  mat- 
ter is  originated  and  sustained"  (p.  136,  Second 
Edition).  He  denies  all  distinction  between 
genius  and  inspiration.  He  doubts  not  that 
*' David,  Solomon,  Isaiah,  or  Paul  would 
have  spoken  of  everything,  which  may  with 
propriety  be  called  a  work  of  genius,  or  of 
cleverness,  or  of  holiness, "  as  "  w^orks  of  the 


INSPIRATION  33 

Spirit  of  God,  written  by  Divine  inspiration" 
(p.  132). 

11.   The  historical  sketch  thus  rapidly  given 
seems  to  show  that  there  have  always  been 
some  slight  differences  of   tone   and   opinion 
tonching   this   important  question,    but    that 
these  differences  have  never  so  markedly  come 
out  as  in  the  nineteenth  century.     The  subject 
at  present  causes  great  anxiety,  and  not  with- 
out reason.     Many  feel  that,  if  they  must  give 
up  a  high  doctrine  of  insj^iration,  they  give  up 
Christianity  ;  and  yet  they  think  that  a  high 
doctrine  is  scarcely  tenable.     Such  a  feeling  is 
not  unnatural,  and  yet  it  is  not  wholly  true. 
All  the  history,  and  even  all  the  great  doc- 
trines   of  the   Gosepl,    might  be  capable  of 
proof,  and  so  deserving  of  credence,  though  we 
were  obliged  to  adopt  almost  the  lowest  of  the 
modern  theories  of  inspiration.     For  instance, 
all,  or  almost  all,   the  arguments  of  Butler, 
Paley,  Lardner,  and  other  like  authors,  are 
independent  of  the  question,   "  What  is  the 
nature  and  degree  of  Spiritual  inspiration  ?" 
Paley,  for  instance,  undertakes  to  prove  the 
truth  of  Christ's  resuiTection  and  of  the  Gos- 
pel history,  and  thence  the  truth  of  the  doc- 
trines which  Christ  taught  to  the  world.     But 
this  he  argues  out,  for  the  most  part,  on  priii- 
3 


34  INSPIRATION. 

ciples  of  common  historical  CAddence.  He 
treats  the  Apostles  as  twelve  common  men, 
of  common  honesty  and  common  intelligence. 
If  they  could  not  have  been  deceived,  and  had 
no  motive  to  deceive  the  world,  then  sm-ely 
we  must  accept  their  testimony  as  true.  Bnt 
if  their  testimony  is  trne,  Jesus  Christ  must 
have  lived,  and  taught,  and  worked  miracles, 
and  risen  from  the  dead,  and  so  in  Him  we 
have  an  accredited  witness  sent  from  God. 
His  teaching,  therefore,  must  have  been  the 
truth  ;  and  if  we  have  good  grounds  for  be- 
lieving that  His  disciples  carefully  treasured 
up  His  teaching,  and  faithfully  handed  it  on 
to  us,  we  have  then  in  the  New  Testament  an 
unquestionable  record  of  the  will  and  of  the 
truth  of  God.  Even  if  the  Apostles  and  Evan- 
gelists had  no  special  inspiration,  yet,  if  we  ad- 
mit their  care  and  fidelity,  we  may  trust  to 
their  testimony,  and  so  accept  their  teaching 
as  true. 

"  So,  then,  even  if  we  were  driven  to  take 
the  lowest  view  of  insj)iration,  we  are  not 
bound  to  give  up  our  faith.  External  evi- 
dence must  almost  of  necessity  begin  by  taking 
low  ground.  It  must  treat  nothing  as  certain 
until  it  is  proved.  It  must  not,  therefore,  even 
presume  that  witnesses  are  honest  till  it  has 


INSPIRATION.  35 

found  reason  to  think  them  so  ;  and,  of  course, 
it  cannot  treat  them  as  inspired  till  it  meets 
with  something  which  compels  an  acknowl- 
edgment of  their  inspiration.  This  is  taking 
the  extremest  case,  one  in  which  we  altogether 
doubt  the  inspiration  of  the  Apostles.  A  for- 
tiori, we  need  not  throw  away  all  faith,  if  we 
should  be  led  to  think  that  some  books  of  the 
Old  Testament  are  only  historical  records,  col- 
lected by  Jewish  antiquarians,  and  bound  up 
with  the  writings  of  prophets,  as  venerable  and 
valuable  memorials  of  the  peculiar  people  of 
God.  All  this  might  be,  and  yet  God  may 
have  spoken  by  holy  men  of  old,  and  after- 
wards more  fully  by  His  Son. 

Some  Christian  controversialists,  who  take 
high  ground  themselves,  write  as  if  they 
thought  that  Christianity  was  not  w^orth  de- 
fending, unless  it  was  defended  exactly  on 
their  principles.  The  minds  of  the  young 
more  especially  are  sometimes  greatly  en- 
dangered by  this  means.  The  defender  of  the 
Gosj^el  may  be  but  an  indifferent  reasoner. 
He  fails  to  make  his  ground  sure  and  strong. 
His  reader  finds  more  forcible,  at  least  more 
specious,  arguments  elsewhere.  He  thinks  the 
advocate  he  rested  on  defeated,  his  arguments 
answered   and   upset,  and    Christianity   itself 


36  INSPIRATION. 

seems  lost.     Now,   we  may  surely  begin  by 
saying,   that    the  question   of    inspiration   is, 
within  certain  limits,   a  question  vritemal  to 
Christianity.       E'o  doubt,   it  may  materially 
affect  the  evidences  of  Christianity  ;  but  the 
questions    of    verbal    inspiration,   mechanical 
inspiration,  dynamical  insj)iration,  and  the  like, 
are  all  questions  on  which  persons  believing 
in  the  Gospel  may  differ.     There  is  a  degree 
of  latitude  which  must  be  fatal  to  faith  ;  but 
within  certain  limits  men  may  differ,  and  yet 
believe.     We  shall  be  wise  to  take  safe  ground 
ourselves,  and  to  bear  as  charitably  as  we  can 
with   those   who   may   take  either  higher  or 
lower.     Only  it  cannot  be  concealed  that  the 
temper  of  mind  which  disposes  to  a  very  low 
doctrine  of  inspiration  is  one  that  ma^  not  im- 
probably lead  in  the  end  to  the  rejection  of 
many  religious  truths — to  scepticism,  if  not  to 
unbeHef. 

12.  It  seems  pretty  generally  agreed  among 
thoughtful  men  at  present,  that  definite  tlie- 
ories  of  insj)iration  are  doubtful  and  danger- 
ous. 

The  existence  of  a  human  element,  and  the 
existence  of  a  Divine  element,  are  generally 
acknowledged  ;  but  the  exact  relation  of  the 
one  to  the  other  it  may  be  difficult  to  define. 


INSPIRATION.  37 

Yet  some  thoughts  may  aid  us  to  an  approxi- 
mation to  the  truth,  perhaps  sufficiently  clear 
for  practical  purposes. 

13.  In  the  iirst  place,  then,  let  us  consider 
for  a  moment  what  is  the  real  princij^le  which 
seems  to  actuate  those  writers  and  thinkers,  of 
the  present  day  especially,  who  endeavor  to 
root  out  all  distinction  between  the  inspiration 
of  the  Apostles  and  Prophets,  and  the  ordinary 
illumination  of  good  and  wise  men.  Is  it  not 
that  morbid  shrinking  from  a  belief  in  any- 
thing miraculous  in  religious  history,  now  so 
commonly  prevalent  ?  that  fear  to  admit  the 
possibility  that  the  Creator  of  the  universe 
should  ever  specially  interfere  with  the  uni- 
verse which  He  has  created  ?  There  can  be  no 
question  l)ut  that  that  inspiration  of  Holy 
Scripture  in  which  the  Church  has  generally 
believed  is  of  the  nature  of  a  miracle  ;  and  so 
its  rejection  follows  upon  the  rejection  of  mir- 
acles in  general.  Many  marvellous  things 
exist  in  nature,  things  at  least  as  marvellous 
as  any  miracles  recorded  in  Scripture.  It  is 
marvellous  that  the  worlds  should  have  come 
into  being,  and  should  all  be  under  the  gov- 
ernment of  the  strictest  laws  and  the  most  un- 
deviating  rules — that  life  should  exist  at  all — 
that  new  life   should  be   constantly   bursting 


38  mSPIBATION. 

forth — that  eyes  should  open  curiously  formed 
to  see,  and  ears  cnrionsly  constnicted  to  hear  ; 
— all  this,  and  much  beside,  is  as  marvellous 
as  the  suspension  of  a  natural  law,  as  the  re- 
storing life  to  the  body  from  which  it  had 
gone  forth,  as  the  giving  sight  to  the  blind,  or 
hearing  to  the  deaf.  But  the  latter  startles  us 
into  conviction  that  some  living  personal  being 
of  creative  power  has  newly  put  forth  his 
strength  ;  the  former  state  of  things  is  so  gen- 
eral, uniform,  and  constantly  recurring,  that 
we  can  go  on  as  usual  without  much  thinking 
of  it,  call  it  nature,  or  perhaps  Deity,  or  any 
other  abstract  generality,  and  so  rest  satisfied. 
14.  Without  doubt  we  witness  in  the  uni- 
verse the  constant  prevalence  of  general  laws, 
and  the  regulation  of  all  things  by  them.  In 
proportion  to  this  general  constancy  is  our 
natural  expectation  that  it  will  continue.  And, 
moreover,  even  though  we  may  be  led  to  be- 
lieve that  the  whole  must  have  been  framed, 
and  that  the  laws  must  have  been'  given  by  a 
creative  intelligence  ;  still  the  uniform  opera- 
tion of  those  laws  disposes  us  to  doubt  the 
probability  that  they  will  ever  be  interfered 
with  by  the  hand  that  first  ordered  them.  This 
doubt  is  strengthened  by  the  belief  tliat  the 
wisdom,  which  first  gave  being  to  an  universe, 


INSPIRATION.  39 

could  never  have  wrought  so  imperfectly  as 
that  its  active  interference  should  afterwards 
be  needed,  to  remedy  defects  or  to  repair  the 
machinery.  And  all  this  might  perhaps  be 
probable  enough,  if  we  could  see  but  a  natural 
creation,  and  if  there  were  no  moral  and  ra- 
tional creation  too.  But  sup230se  it  to  be  true, 
that  there  is  in  the  physical  universe,  and 
more  or  less  connected  with  matter  and  the 
laws  of  matter,  a  multitude  of  intelligent,  ra- 
tional, moral,  and  accountable  beings  ;  some 
more  powerful  than  others  ;  some,  the  angels, 
wholly  good  ;  some,  tlie  evil  angels,  wholly 
bad  ;  some  of  a  mixed  character,  like  man  ;  all 
capable,  more  or  less,  of  communication  with 
each  other — those  indeed  of  mixed  character 
closely  connected  with  matter,  joined  to  ]na- 
terial  bodies,  whilst  the  more  powerful  intel- 
ligences, good  and  evil,  are  freer  and  more  in- 
dependent of  mere  physical  inHuences  :  sup- 
pose, too,  that  there  is  one  great  Intellect,  one 
Sovereign  Mind,  who  made  all,  and  who  gov- 
erns all  ;  vni\\  premises  like  these,  where  is  the 
improbability  that  there  should  be  occasional 
interferences  with  natural  laws  ?  Life  does  not 
exist  at  all  without  producing  some  interfer- 
ence with  the  mere  laws  of  matter  and  motion. 
Where  intelligent  beings  exist  capable  of  acting 


40  INSPIRATION, 

on  material  substances,  they  ever  do  nionid 
those  material  substances  to  their  will,  and 
make  the  laws  of  nature  serve  them.  If  cre- 
ated intelligences  superior  to  man  have  any 
power  to  act  through  material  instruments,  we 
should  expect  that  they  could  only  act,  as  man 
does,  by  taking  advantage  of  the  laws  by 
which  matter  is  guided,  and  so  controlling  one 
law  by  bringing  a  more  powerful  law  to  bear 
upon  it.  Even  of  the  providence  of  the  Su- 
preme Being,  if  that  providence  be  contin- 
ually at  work,  controlhng  the  moral  and  intel- 
lectual, and  upholding  the  material  creation, 
it  is  most  probable  that  such  providential 
agency  would  be  exercised  in  overruling  and 
directing  natural  causes  and  laws  rather  than 
in  displacing  or  superseding  them.  But  there 
certainly  seems  no  a  priori  improbability  that 
the  Creator  should  be  also  the  Ruler  of  the 
universe  ;  that  where  the  creation  is  moral  and 
intelligent,  He  should  rule  and  interfere  as 
He  might  not  where  it  was  simply  material  or 
animal  ;  that,  where  moral,  personal  beings 
were  acting  upon  one  another,  striving  to 
benefit,  and  striving  to  ruin  one  another,  He 
too  at  times  should  be  at  hand,  to  punish  or 
to  protect.  And  so  the  doctrine  of  a  special 
providence    seems    only   consistent   with    the 


INSPIRATION.  41 

belief  in  a  personal  God.  But  the  step  from 
thence  to  a  belief  in  miracles  is  no  great  stride. 
For,  if  the  great  jDcrsonal  Creator  rules  and 
guides  and  interferes  in  the  affairs  of  His  cre- 
ation, though  he  would  be  likeliest  to  do  so 
commonly  by  mere  guidance  of  natural  laws, 
yet,  if  there  were  need  or  occasion  for  it,  it 
must  be  quite  as  easy  for  Him  to  interfere  by 
the  entire  suspension  of  those  laws,  or  by  a 
temporary  alteration  of  them."^ 

15.  Indeed  it  is  hard  to  see  how  miracles 
should  appear  either  impossible  or  improbable  ; 
but  either  on  the  theory  that  what  we  see 
commonly  we  must  see  always,  or  else  on  the 
theory  that  there  is  no  i3ersonal  providence  of 
God.  And,  in  short,  is  it  not  true,  that  the 
natural  tendency  of  those  who  try  to  get  rid  of 
miracle  and  special  inspiration  is  to  the  resolv- 
ing of  providence  into  law,  and  of  God  into 

*  Of  course,  if  the  Professor  Baden  Powell's  theory  be 
true,  that  the  physical  and  the  spiritual  worlds  are  so 
separate  that  they  can  never  come  in  contact,  then  all  this 
is  impossible.  But  then  all  creation  is  impossible.  The 
spiritual  could  never  have  created  the  material.  In 
deed,  the  union  of  soul  and  body  must  ])e  impossible  ; 
at  all  events,  all  religious  knowledge  must  be  impos- 
sible. It  can  be  founded  on  no  evidence,  and  can  result 
only  from  certain  convictions  of  the  mind,  wholly  in- 
capal)le  of  being  tested  as  to  their  truth. 


42  INSPIRATION. 

simple  intelligence  ?  We  are  all  well  aware 
tliat  we  see  the  government  of  law,  not  only 
in  the  physical,  but  even  in  the  intellectual 
world  ;  and  there  are  those,  who,  from  ob- 
serving this,  have  been  led  to  a  belief  in  law, 
and  nothing  but  law.  God  with  them  is  but 
law  ;  and  providential  or  moral  government 
gives  place  to  mere  necessity.  Of  course,  this 
is  simple  Atheism,  and  involves  all  the  diffi- 
culties, as  well  as  all  the  miseries,  of  Atheism. 
And  yet,  surely  it  is  more  consistent  and  log- 
ical than  the  system,  which  does  not  deny  the 
wisdom  that  seems  to  have  planned  and  still 
seems  to  order  all  things,  but  which  yet  shrinks 
from  acknowledging  the  distinct,  individual 
personahty  of  the  Creator,  His  personal  pres- 
ence to  all  the  universe  which  He  has  created. 
His  superintending  providence  over  it,  and  His 
active  interference  in  it.  Unquestionably  this 
latter  is  the  doctrine  of  the  Hebrew  Bible, 
and  that  which  Jesns  Christ  taught  in  the  Ser- 
mon on  the  Mount.  Bnt  philosophic  religion 
talks  to  us  of  a  general  principle  of  intelligence 
diffused  throughout  all  things,  moving,  and 
breathing  in,  and  animating  all  beings.  !Now 
this  general  principle  of  intelligence  sounds 
philosoj^hical  enough  ;  but  how  can  it  be  rec- 
onciled with  what  Englishmen   call  common- 


INSPIRATION.  43 

sense  ?  Wliat,  on  principles  of  common  reason, 
can  be  meant  by  intelligence  where  there  is  no 
intellect,  or  a  great  principle  of  mind  where 
there  is  no  personal  mind  at  all  ?  We  know 
what  is  meant  by  the  intelligence  of  a  man,  or 
the  intelligence  of  a  beast — intelligence  being 
the  j)ower  of  perceiving,  miderstanding,  and 
reasoning  predicable  of  the  mind  of  that  man 
or  that  beast.  In  like  manner  we  can  under- 
stand, that  if  there  be  one  great  infinite  mind, 
then  infinite  intelligence  may  be  predicable  of 
that  infinite  mind.  But  to  say  that  there  is 
any  general  principle  of  intelligence  separable 
and  distinguishable  from  any  particular  mind, 
is  surely  to  palter  with  ns  in  a  double  sense. 
We  can  no  more  appreciate  intelligence  as 
separated  from  the  intellect  of  which  it  is  a 
quality  or  attribute,  than  Ave  can  understand 
agency  without  an  agent,  potency  withont  a 
power,  sight  without  a  seer,  thought  without  a 
thinker,  or  life  without  that  which  lives.  In 
short,  may  we  not  demnr  altogether  to  mere 
abstractions,  except  as  they  may  exist  in  the 
mind,  or  in  systems  of  philosophy  ?  And  so, 
is  not  the  conclusion  inevitable,  that  our  real 
alternative  lies  l)etween  a  mere  Stoical  law,  a 
Buddhist  Kharma,  blind  and  inexorable,  work- 
ing in  matter,  it  is  nseless  to  inquire  whence 


44  INSPIRATION. 

or  how — between  this  and  a  belief  in  a  God, 
personal,  present,  Maker,  Rnler,  G  aider  of  all 
things,  and  of  all  men  ? 

16.  Give  us  this,  as  the  Bible  gives  Him  to 
US  :  and  though  we  should  never  expect  Him 
to  be  perpetually  setting  aside  the  laws  which 
He  has  made  for  the  universe,  yet  we  need  not 
— rather  we  cannot^believe,  that  He  should 
be  so  inevitably  fettered  by  them,  as  that  He 
should  not  continually  guide  them  for  the  good 
of  His  intelligent  and  moral  creatures — guide 
them  as  in  a  less  degree  those  creatures  them- 
selves can  guide  them,  or  that,  when  He  may 
see  lit.  He  should  not  suspend,  or  even  for  a 
season  alter  them.  And  if  this  latter  contin- 
gency should  ever  take  place,  we  should  natu- 
rally expect  that  it  would  be  never  so  probable 
as  when  it  was  His  pleasure  to  communicate  to 
rational  beings  some  special  revelation  of  His 
will,  and  to  teach  them  concerning  Himself 
what  they  might  not  be  able  to  learn  from 
mere  natural  phenomena. 

Can  there  be  any  inconsistency  in  such  a 
putting  aside  of  the  veil  of  nature,  and  giv- 
ing man  a  somewhat  clearer  vision  of  God  ? 
Doubtless,  other  causes  are  possible.  God 
might  be  pleased,  instead  of  making  any  objec- 
tive communications  to  mankind,  to  breathe 


IJVSPIRA  TION.  4  5 

silently  into  eacli  individual  spirit,  and  to  teach 
separately  each  one  of  Tlis  will  and  of  Him- 
self. But  no  one  has  a  right  to  say  that  such 
must  be  God's  plan  of  action — that  such  only 
is  consistent  with  Divine  wisdom,  or  human 
capacity,  or  philosophical  theology.  If  God 
be  not  the  mere  pervading  intelligence,  which 
informs  the  universe,  but  which  can  exert  it- 
self only  through  the  medium  of  things  in  the 
universe  ;  if,  on  the  contrary,  He  is  a  personal, 
present  ruler  and  guide,  there  can  be  no  in- 
consistency in  the  belief  that  He  may  at  times 
let  Himself  be  heard  by  those  who  can  hear 
Him — in  other  and  clearer  tones  than  the 
voices  of  mere  natural  phenomena,  or  even  of 
the  intuitional  consciousness. 

17.  Now,  the  common  course  which  we  see 
philosophic  scepticism  taking  at  present  is 
this  :  First,  there  is  a  doubt  about  miracles, 
then  about  special  inspiration.  To  build  our 
faith  in  any  degree  on  miracles  is  unwise.  In- 
spiration is  wholly  a  question  of  degree.  One 
man  has  by  the  teaching  or  breathing  of  God's 
Spirit  greater  insight  into  spiritual  truth  than 
another.  The  Apostles,  doubtless,  had  an  un- 
usual brightness  of  such  vision,  and  so  we  may 
truly  call  their  writings  inspired  ;  but  the 
difference  between  their  inspiration  and  that 


4  6  INSPIRA  TION. 

of  St.  Augustine,  or  even  of  Plato,  is  but  a 
difference  of  degree.  Next  comes  a  doubt  or 
a  denial  of  the  existence  of  personal  spiritual 
beings.  The  devil,  Satan,  wicked  spirits  are 
but  names  for  a  general  evil  2^1'inciple,  which 
we  cannot  but  see  and  feel  influencing  and 
pervading  ourselves  and  all  things  around  us. 
Angels  are  soon  jjlaced  in  the  same  category  ; 
and  the  last  step  of  all  reduces  God  Himself 
to  a  principle  of  intelligence,  if  it  does  not  go 
yet  farther,  and  make  Him  but  a  law. 

But  in  all  honesty,  is  there  a  middle  course  ? 
Does  not  the  Bible  at  all  events — Old  Testa- 
ment and  JS^ew  alike — speak  of  a  present,  j^er- 
sonal  God,  of  a  multitude  of  personal  spiritual 
beings — some  good  and  others  evil — working 
around  us  and  within  us,  of  miracles  wrought 
by  teachers  sent  from  God,  of  predictions  ut- 
tered before  the  event,  of  holy  men  of  old 
moved  by  the  Spirit  of  God  to  speak  things, 
which  could  be  known  to  none  but  God  Him- 
self ?  It  is  quite  impossible  to  get  rid  of  all 
this,  and  to  retain  the  Bible  as  in  any  proper 
sense  true.  Let  it  be  said,  that  good  men  who 
wrote  books  of  the  Bible  were  good  men,  but 
spoke  according  to  the  prejudices  of  their 
times.  They  believed  in  prophecies  and  mir- 
acles, and  evil  spirits,  and  so  spoke  of  them. 


INSPIRATION.  47 

Their  inspiration  quickened  their  intuitions, 
but  it  did  not  make  them  infallible,  and  so  in 
these  matters  they  may  have  erred.  But,  if 
Christianity  be  Christianity,  and  not  a  system 
of  mere  morals  and  philosophy,  there  was  One 
Man,  who  was  so  much  more  than  man,  that 
if  we  disbelieve  Him,  we  make  God  Himself 
a  liar.  And  may  we  not  ask,  if  His  discoui-ses 
be  not  so  unfaithfully  handed  down  to  us  that 
we  mia^ht  as  well  or  better  not  have  them  at 
all,  whether  He  did  not  perpetually  appeal  to 
miracles,  whether  He  did  not  continually  quote 
prophecies  as  fulfilled  or  soon  to  be  fulfilled, 
whether  He  did  not  speak  much  of  angels  and 
devils,  whether  He  did  not  in  the  most  signal 
manner  promise  to  His  disciples  the  guidance 
and  teaching  of  His  Holy  Spirit,  to  bring  to 
their  remembrance  all  that  He  had  said  to  them, 
and  to  lead  them  into  all  truth  ?  Is  it  possible 
to  reject  all  this  without  rejecting  Christ  ? 

18.  And  so  much  of  miracles  and  inspiration 
generally.  K^ow  let  us  take  a  few  facts,  and 
see  what  they  seem  to  teach  us.  We  have  a 
number  of  different  books  written  in  different 
styles,  indicating  the  different  characters  of 
the  writers.  At  times,  too,  there  appear  sliglit 
diversities  of  statements  in  trifling  matters  of 
detail.     Here  we  mark  a  human  element.     If 


48  INSPIRATION. 

God  spoke,  it  is  plain  that  He  spoke  through 
man  ;  if  God  inspired,  He  inspired  man. 
Even  the  Gospel  7niraGles  were  often  worked 
with  some  instrumental  means  ;  no  wonder, 
then,  that  when  God  wonld  teach  men.  He 
would  teach  through  human  agency.  And 
the  difference  of  style — perhaps  the  slight  dis- 
crepancies in  statements  —  seem  to  satisfy  us 
that  some  portions  at  least  of  the  Bible  were 
not  simply  dictated  by  God  to  man  ;  there 
was  not  what  is  called  mere  mechanical  or 
organic  insj)iration  ;  God  did  not  simply 
speak  God's  words,  using  as  a  mere  machine 
man's  hps  to  speak  them  with.  Of  course, 
we  must  not  forget  the  benefit  we  derive  from 
these  differences  between  writers  of  the  same 
narrative.  The  apj)arent  or  trifling  discrep- 
ancies in  the  statements  of  the  different  Evan- 
gelists, for  instance,  convince  us  that  they  were 
independent  witnesses,  and  that  the  whole  story 
did  not  arise  from  some  well- concerted  plan  to 
deceive  the  world  :  the  homely  and  even  bar- 
barous style  of  some  of  the  writers  proves  to  us 
that  they  were  really  fishermen,  and  not  philos- 
ophers ;  and  so  we  have  a  convincing  evidence 
that  the  deepest  system  of  theology,  and  the  no- 
blest code  of  ethics  ever  j^ropounded — the  one 
stirring  the  depths  of  the  whole  human  heart, 


INSPIRATION.  49 

the  other  guiding  all  human  life — came,  not 
from  the  profound  speculations  of  the  wisest 
of  mankind,  but  either  from  God  Himself,  or 
else  from  a  source  more  inexplicable  and  im- 
possible ;  from  the  poor,  the  narrow-minded, 
and  the  untaught.  But  whilst  we  see  the  ben- 
efit of  all  this,  and  admire  the  wisdom  which 
so  ordered  it,  we  learn  from  it  that  there  must 
have  been  a  human  element  in  Scripture  ;  that 
God  may,  nay  must,  have  spoken,  but  that  He 
dealt  His  own  common  dealing  with  us — that 
is.  He  used  earthly  instruments  for  giving 
heavenly  blessings,  human  means  for  commu- 
nicating Divine  truth. 

Now,  let  us  look  the  other  way.  Scripture 
is  not  a  mere  system  of  theology,  nor  is  it  a 
mere  historical  record.  If  it  were  either  or 
both  of  these,  and  nothing  more,  of  course  we 
could  believe  that  nothing  might  be  needed, 
beyond  the  quickening  of  the  intuitional  con- 
sciousness, to  enable  men  to  conceive  its  truths 
and  to  communicate  them  to  others.  There 
is,  however,  as  has  been  already  noticed,  a 
distinctly  miraculous  element  in  it  ;  and  here, 
if  we  admit  its  existence,  we  cannot  fail  to  see 
the  working  of  a  present,  personal  God.  Take 
away  the  miraculous  element,  and  we  may 
easily  get  into  any  kind  of  philosophical  ab- 
4 


50  INSPIRATION. 

straction.  Admit  it,  and  we  are  brought  back 
again  into  the  intelKgible  region  of  common, 
plain  sense. 

If  anything  in  the  world  can  be  supernatu- 
ral or  miraculous,  it  surely  must  be  the  infal- 
lible foreknowledge  of  future  events.  No  ele- 
vation of  the  intuitional  consciousness  can  ac- 
count for  such  foreknowledge.  I^one  can  cer- 
tainly foretell  the  future,  but  one  who  can 
certainly  guide  the  future.  Do  we,  then, 
admit  that  any  of  the  prophets  in  the  Old  Tes- 
tament were  enabled  to  foretell  coming  events, 
the  events  of  the  Gospel  history  in  particular  ? 
Some  modern  writers  go  so  far  as  to  deny  this 
in  toto.  According  to  them  every  prophecy  of 
the  Old  Testament  concerned,  primarily  at 
least,  contemporaneous  history,  or  history  so 
nearly  contemporaneous,  that  it  required  only 
common  foresight  and  "  old  experience"  to 
look  into  it.  Burke  early  shadowed  forth  the 
French  Ke volution  :  Isaiah,  on  the  same  prin- 
ciple, could  forew^arn  Israel  of  its  dangers, 
threaten  sinners  with  punishment,  and  prom- 
ise protection  to  penitents.  Of  course,  w^e 
can  understand  such  a  view  ;  but  can  we  admit 
it  and  not  reject  Christianity  ?  And  let  us 
remember  that,  in  arguing  on  the  nature  of 
inspiration,  we  are   not   arguing  in  proof  of 


INSPIRATION.  51 

Christianity  ;  but  tliat,  admitting  tlie  truth  of 
Christianity,  we  are  inquiring  into  somewhat 
which,  as  has  been  ah'eady  observed,  is  really 
internal  to  Christianity.  Most  Christians  are 
ready  to  believe  that  the  passages  of  the  Old 
Testament  to  which  our  Lord  and  his  Apos- 
tles appealed,  as  proofs  of  His  Divine  mission 
and  of  the  truth  of  their  teaching,  were  really 
predictions,  and  not  guesses.  This  is  not  the 
place  to  enter  at  length  into  such  a  question. 
But,  if  we  just  think  of  what  Jacob  said  of 
Shiloh — Moses,  of  a  2:)ropliet  like  himself — 
David  and  others,  of  a  great  Son  of  David — 
Isaiah,  in  his  ninth  and  iifty-third  chapters,  of 
a  Child  born,  a  Son  given,  called  Mighty  God, 
Eternal  Father,  Prince  of  Peace,  and  of  a 
righteous  Servant,  on  whom  the  Lord  should 
lay  the  iniquity  of  us  all — Daniel,  of  Messiah 
the  Prince,  cut  off,  but  not  for  Himself,  and 
of  one  like  a  Son  of  Man,  to  whom  a  king- 
dom is  given  by  the  Ancient  of  days,  an  ever- 
lasting kingdom,  a  dominion  that  shall  not 
pass  away — Haggai,  of  the  glory  of  the  second 
temple,  so  much  surpassing  that  of  the  lirst 
— Malaclii,  of  the  forenmner  of  the  Messiah — 
and  many  prophecies  of  like  kind  ;  we  shall 
feel  that  the  burden  of  proof  must  lie  with 
those  who  deny,  not  with  those  who  believe. 


r 


52  INSPIRATION. 

that  there  were  prophets,  who  bore  witness  to 
the  coming  of  the  Christ  centuries  before  His 
birth.  *  We  may  remember  that  these  predic- 
tions have  been  preserved  to  ns  both  in  the 
original  Hebrew,  and  in  translations  made 
from  the  Hebrew  before  the  birth  of  Christ, 
made  not  by  Christians,  but  by  Jews — that 
the  more  ancient  Jews  did  undeniably  inter- 
pret these  prophecies,  as  pointing  forward  to  a 
prince  who  should  be  sent  from  heaven  to  save 
their  own  nation,  and  to  bless  other  nations  in 
them.  Comparatively  modern  Jews  have  ex- 
plained some  of  these  prophecies  away,  be- 
cause they  too  manifestly  favor  the  Chris- 
tians ;  but  even  so,  they  continue  to  believe 
that  the  Scriptures  foretold  a  Messiah.  More- 
over, we  have  the  clearest  testimonies  from 
Jews  and  Gentiles  alike  (Jews  and  Gentiles 

*  It  matters  little  to  this  argument  whether  all  the 
books  of  the  Old  Testament  were  written  by  those  whose 
names  they  bear  ;  whether,  for  instance,  the  last  chap- 
ters of  Isaiah  were  Isaiah's  or  some  other's  ;  whether  the 
book  of  Daniel  was  written  at  the  time  of  the  captivity, 
or  not  collected  till  some  centuries  later.  It  is  certain 
they  were  all  written  before  Christ ;  and  if  in  them  there 
be  found  prophecies  of  the  Messiah,  prophecies,  be  they 
many  or  few,  like  precious  stones  imbedded  in  a  rock  ; 
we  have  then  the  phenomenon  existing,  and  we  have  to 
explain  how  it  came.  Idoneum,  opinor,  testimonium 
divinitatis  Veritas  divinationis.^  (Tert.  Apolog,  c.  20.) 


INSPIRATION.  53 

wlio  never  became  Christians,  and  so  are  inde- 
pendent witnesses)  that  in  the  East  generally, 
Oriente  toto,  and  especially  among  the  Israel- 
ites themselves,  there  had  prevailed  an  ancient 
and  constant  persuasion  that  by  Divine  ap- 
pointment a  Deliverer  was  to  arise  out  of 
Judea,  who  should  have  dominion  ;  and,  more- 
over, that  he  was  impatiently  expected  in  the 
reigns  of  the  early  emperors  of  Rome.  Jews, 
who  have  lived  since  those  times,  have  con- 
fessed that  the  period  presignified  is  appar- 
ently past.  Now,  it  is  quite  certain  that  the 
most  remarkable  and  most  influential  religious 
teacher  that  ever  lived  in  any  nation  upon 
earth  did  arise  and  live  in  Judea,  at  the  time 
so  marked  and  agreed  on.  It  is  undoubted  that 
He  declared  the  predictions  in  question  to 
have  pointed  to  Him.  His  followers  have  al- 
ways claimed  them  as  fulfilled  in  Him.  Of  all 
religious  revolutions,  nay,  of  all  revolutions, 
moral,  spiritual,  social,  or  political,  ever  pro- 
duced in  the  world.  He  has  produced  the 
greatest,  the  most  influential,  the  most  exten- 
sive. As  Christians,  we,  of  course,  believe 
that  He  was  the  Christ  ;  and  we  are  justifled 
in  urging  on  the  Jews  such  considerations  as 
the  above,  in  proof  that  their  own  cherished 
Scriptures  pointed  to  Him. 


54  INSPIRATION. 

Now,  if  the  prophets  really  did  centuries 
before  foresee  an  event,  most  unlikely,  but 
which  we  have  witnessed  as  true,  they  must 
have  had  something  more  than  the  inspiration 
of  genius,  or  than  the  exalting  of  their  intui- 
tional consciousness.  For,  whatever  degree  of 
insight  into  the  truth  of  things  spiritual  we 
may  attribute  to  such  intuitional  consciousness, 
and  whatever  communion  it  may  give  with 
the  mind  of  God,  it  can  hardly  be  said  to 
make  us  partakers  of  God's  omniscience,  or  to 
endue  us  with  His  powers  of  foresight. 

One  of  the  favorite  modes  of  evading  such 
conclusions  as  this,  and  so  one  of  the  favorite 
positions  of  the  low  inspirationists  is,  that  Ni- 
hilin  scripto  quod  non  jpriiis  inscrijytore  /  a 
man  can  S23eak  nothing  but  what  he  thinks. 
In  a  sense  this  is  true  enough  ;  and,  as  a  gen- 
eral rule,  we  may  suppose  the  holy  men  of 
old,  who  spake  as  they  were  moved  by  the 
Holy  Ghost,  to  have  been  first  gifted  with  the 
knowledge  of  the  future,  and  then  moved  to 
communicate  that  knowledge  to  others.  But 
still,  if  there  be  an  overruling  and  over-guid- 
ing Providence  as  well  as  an  informing  and 
inspiring  Spirit,  may  not  a  man  be  guided 
to  speak  unconsciously  words  of  deep  import  ? 
"We  see  this  in  the  Old  Testanient  in  the  case 


INSPIRATION.  55 

of  Balaam.  If  the  liistorv  of  liini  be  not  a 
false  legend  or  a  mere  myth,  the  Almighty 
told  him  that  he  was  to  speak  to  Balak  that 
word  which  was  put  into  his  month.  His  will 
was  qnite  the  other  way.  He  willed  to  curse 
Israel,  and  so  to  obtain  from  Balak  the  w^ages 
of  unrighteousness  ;  but  his  own  will  was  over- 
ruled by  the  direct  command  of  God.  If  Ba- 
laam prophesied,  if  he  proj^hesied,  as  most 
Christians  have  believed,  not  only  of  the  future 
fortunes  of  Israel,  but  of  the  future  coming 
of  Christ ;  it  is  certain  that  his  extraordinary 
knowledge  could  not  have  been  the  result  of 
his  purity  of  heart  qualifying  him  to  see  God, 
could  not  have  come  from  the  clearing  away 
of  those  clouds  of  sin,  and  therefore  of  er- 
ror, which  darken  the  mental  vision  ;  for  his 
heart  was  set  upon  covetousness,  and  he  per- 
ished with  the  enemies  of  God.  The  same, 
or  nmch  the  same,  may  be  said  of  Caiaphas, 
who  was  altogether  bent  on  evil,  and  yet  of 
whom  the  Evangelist  testifies  that  "  being 
High  Priest  that  year  he  prophesied."  If 
miracles  are  impossible,  of  course,  all  this  is 
impossible.  But  how  miracles  can  be  impossi- 
ble, unless  God  is  impossible,  it  seems  that 
we  have  yet  to  learn. 

Though,  therefore,   we  may  not  generally 


56*  INSPIRATION. 

look  for  a  work  of  the  Spirit  tlirongh  the  mere 
bodily  organs  of  men,  without  an  elevation 
of  their  souls  ;  we  surely  have  no  j)ower  to 
limit  the  operations  of  God,  or  to  say  that  He 
may  not,  if  He  will,  use  the  very  unconscious 
words  of  wicked  men  as  well  as  the  heart 
service  of  pious  men. 

19.  But  farther,  is  it  not  true  that  Almighty 
Grod  has  made  even  aots  and  histories  to 
prophesy,  independently  of  any  utterance  of 
men's  mouths  ?  Are  there  not  types  in  the 
Law,  and  through  all  the  Old  Testament  his- 
tory, which  have  their  antitypes  in  the  New 
Testament  ?  There  are  those,  no  doubt,  who 
will  say  that  we  can  find  historical  parallels  in 
profane,  as  readily  as  in  sacred,  history.  But 
are  these  really  to  be  compared  with  the  sacri- 
fice of  Isaac  typifying  the  death  and  resurrec- 
tion of  Christ — with  the  history  of  Joseph, 
sold  by  his  brethren,  and  then  exalted  to  be 
their  prince  and  saviour — with  the  brazen  ser- 
pent, lifted  up  to  heal  all  that  looked  on  it — 
with  the  passage  of  the  Eed  Sea,  and  other 
parables  put  forth  by  the  history  of  the  Exo- 
dus— with  the  priesthood  of  Aaron,  the  j^ass- 
over,  the  ceremonies  on  the  day  of  atonment, 
and  the  many  Levitical  rites  forepicturing 
Christ — with  the  kingly  types,  such  as  David 


INSPIRATION.  57 

and  Solomon — with  the  prophetic  parallelism 
of  Elijah  and  John  the  Baptist — and  the  many 
others,  too  many  to  enumerate  now  ?  "^  If 
there  be,  as  the  writers  of  the  New  Testament 
all  assert,  and  as  Christians  have  ever  hitherto 
believed,  a  complete  system  of  tyj^e  and  anti- 
type in  the  Old  and  New  Testament  respective- 
ly ;  to  what  can  we  attribute  this,  but  to  an 
overruling  Hand  guiding  the  fortunes  of  the 
chosen  race,  and  of  individuals  in  that  race,  and 
to  the  continual  presence  of  that  Holy  Spirit 
who  divideth  to  every  man  severally  as  He 
will  ?  Is  not  all  this  to  be  esteemed  a  special 
inspiration  ?  And  if  all  this  is  in  the  Old  Tes- 
tament, then,  whatever  human  elements  there 
be  in  it,  there  is  surely  such  a  Divine  element 

*  Professor  Jowett  thinks  we  must  give  up  the  types 
appealed  to  in  the  New  Testament,  just  as  we  do  not 
press  the  patristic  appeal  to  the  scarlet  thread  of  Rahab, 
or  the  318  followers  of  Abraham.  That  is  to  say,  we 
must  attach  no  more  importance  to  the  language  of  the 
Apostles,  or  of  our  blessed  Lord  Himself,  than  to  the 
language  of  any  Christian  writer  in  the  earlier  da3's  of 
Christianity.  The  New  Testament  has  appealed  to  types 
of  Christ  in  the  Old  Testament.  The  early  Christians 
universally  acknowledged  such  types,  but  perhaps  un- 
wisely found  moreover  certain  fanciful  resemblances 
unknown  to  the  Apostles  and  Evangelists.  Because  the 
latter  were  fanciful,  must  we  conclude  that  the  former 
were  false  ? 


58  INSPIRATION. 

as  to  make  its  books  emphatically  the  ' '  Ora- 
cles of  God,"  to  which  we  may  look  as  unmis- 
takably embodying  His  will  and  word.  We 
may  admit  that  the  word  of  God  so  embodied 
in  the  ScrijDtnres  was  designed  to  communicate 
to  us  great  moral  and  spiritual  truths,  that 
there  was  no  pur^DOse  to  give  any  revelation  of 
physical  science  or  of  mere  general  history. 
Yet  if  we  have  abundant  evidence  that  Al- 
mighty God  chose  the  prophets  and  the  books 
of  the  Bible  as  channels  for  communicating 
His  will  to  mankind,  we  have  surely  abundant 
evidence  that  they  would  not  be  permitted  to 
err  in  things  pertaining  to  God.  It  may  not 
be  proof  that  their  language  will  not  be  po]3u- 
lar,  and  so  possibly  inaccurate,  in  matters  of 
science,  or  that  their  statements  will  be  in- 
fallible in  the  matter  of  a  date  or  in  other 
things  immaterial  ;  but  it  is  surely  proof 
enough  that  they  would  never  be  permitted  to 
mislead  us  in  questions  of  faith  ;  for  otherwise 
they  would  bring  us  credentials  to  their  faith- 
fulness from  God  Himself,  and  with  these  cre- 
dentials in  their  hands,  deceive,  and  mislead, 
and  delude  us. 

And  here  may  we  not  see  the  fallacy  of  Cole- 
ridge's view,  who  accepts  Scripture  where  it 


INSPIRATION.  59 

^^  linds"  liini,  but  not  in  its  less  interesting  and 
merely  historical  records  ?     If  we  go  on  this 
principle,  where  are  we  to  stop  ?     If  we  read 
the  second  book  of  Chronicles,  perhaps  we  may 
discover  very  little  Avhich  "  finds"  us  ;  where- 
as, if  w^e  read  Baxter's   '  Saint's  Everlasting 
Rest, '  it  may  ' '  iind  ' '  us  in  nearly  every  page. 
To  carry  out  Coleridge's  principle,  we  ought  to 
uncanonize,   or  reject  the  inspiration   of,  the 
book  of  Chronicles,  and  set  uj)  as  canonical  the 
book  of   Baxter.     But,    if  our  former  argu- 
ments be  correct,  and  the   general  belief   of 
Christians  in  all  ages  be  true,  the   whole  his- 
torical record  of   the   Old   Testament  is  part 
of  the  great  depository  of  God's  revealed  will. 
One  part   may  be   more  important  than  an- 
other.    But  when  we  see  that  God  spoke  by 
words  of  man,  and  also  by  acts  of  man — that 
even  actions  were  predictions — when  we  find 
Christ  Himself  and  His  Apostles    citing  the 
books  of  the  Old  Testament,  as  the   "  Scrip- 
tures," as  the  ''  Oracles  of  God,"  as   "  God- 
breathed  "  {SeoTtvevara) — surely  w^e  have  no 
right  to  say  that  one  part  "  linds  me"  and  an- 
other does  not,  and  to  settle  our  own  Canon  ac- 
cordingly.    The  whole  collection  of  the  books 
of  the  Old  Testament  comes  to  us  with  Divine 


(50  INSPIRATION. 

credentials  —  prophecies  in  it  fulfilled  after 
tliey  were  uttered  —  Christ's  attestation  to 
them,  that  they  all  testified  of  Him — St. 
Paul's  testimony  to  them  that  they  were 
'^  given  by  inspiration  of  God" — and,  having 
such  Divine  credentials,  we  cannot  suppose 
that  any  of  these  books  would  mislead  us,  at 
least  in  things  heavenly. 

20.  If  all  this  holds  of  the  Old  Testament, 
it  holds,  a  fortiori,  of  the  ISTew  ;  for  probably 
no  one  will  contend  that  the  Apostles,  mth 
Christ's  own  mission,  with  the  gift  of  tongues 
and  miraculous  powers,  with  the  special  prom- 
ise of  the  Comforter  and  of  guidance  by  Him 
into  all  truth,  with  the  assurance  of  Christ's 
own  presence,  and  with  the  command  to  preach 
on  the  house-tops  what  He  had  told  them  in 
the  ear, — were  in  a  worse  position  or  more 
liable  to  error  than  the  ]jrophets  of  the  Old 
Testament.  And,  though  we  may  well  be- 
lieve that  each  individual  Apostle,  like  every 
Christian  man,  may  have  grown  in  grace  and 
in  the  knowledge  of  our  Lord  and  Saviour 
Jesus  Christ  ;  yet  this  belief  need  in  nowise 
interfere  with  our  acknowledgment  that  mes- 
sengers, specially  accredited  by  God  to  man, 
would  never  be  permitted  to  deliver  a  false 


INSPIRATION.  61 

message,  or  to  mislead  those  whom  they  were 
so  signally  commissioned  to  lead.* 

For  Mr,  Maurice's  question,  as  to  whether 

*  Revelation  has  all  along  been  progressive,  but  not 
on  that  account  self -contradictory.  Abel  offered  the 
firstlings  of  his  flock  ;  x\.braham  offered  a  ram  instead  of 
his  son  ;  Moses  instituted  the  Paschal  sacrifice  ;  John  the 
Baptist  pointed  to  "  the  Lamb  of  God,  which  taketh 
away  the  sin  of  the  world  ; ' '  St,  Paul  spoke  of  ' '  Christ 
our  Passover;"  St,  Peter  of  "the  precious  blood  of 
Christ,  as  of  a  lamb  without  blemish  and  without  spot, ' ' 
There  is  the  same  testimony  here  through  a  course  of  at 
least  four  thousand  years  ;  but  yet  the  knowledge  was  pro- 
gressive. John  the  Baptist  knew  more  of  C'hrist  than 
all  that  before  him  had  been  born  of  woman,  but  less 
than  the  least  in  the  kingdom  of  the  Saviour,  What  is 
true  of  the  knowledge  of  the  Church  ma}^  be  equally 
true  of  the  knowledge  of  the  Apostles.  If  they  had  not 
been  capable  of  growth  in  wisdom,  they  would  not  have 
been  human  ;  but  no  proof  whatever  has  yet  been  given 
that  the  testimony  of  one  Apostle  is,  on  points  of  Chris- 
tian doctrine,  in  conflict  with  the  testimony  of  another, 
or  that  the  more  matured  knowledge  of  any  particular 
Apostle  ever  led  him  to  contradict,  in  the  least  degree, 
his  own  former  witness  to  the  truth.  Certainly  they 
themselves  always  appeal  to  the  consistency  of  their  own 
teaching,  and  denounce  all  teachinir  which  is  inconsistent 
with  their  own.  "  Though  we  or  an  angel  from  heaven 
preach  any  other  Gospel  unto  you  than  that  which  wc 
have  preached  unto  you,  let  him  be  accursed,"  (Gal.  i. 
8.)  "  If  there  come  any  unto  you,  and  bring  not  this 
doctrine,  receive  him  not  into  your  house,  neither  bid 
him  God  speed."    (2  John  10,) 


62  INSPIRATION. 

we  onglit  not  to  consider  tlie  inspiration  of 
Holy  Scripture  like  to  that  inspiration  for 
wliicli  all  of  ns  pray,  there  seems  but  little 
difficulty  in  the  reply.  Undoubtedly,  the  in- 
spiration for  which  we  pray  is  the  same  as 
the  inspiration  of  the  writers  of  Scripture — 
that  is  to  say,  it  is  the  inspiration  of  God's  Holy 
Spirit  which  guides  not  only  into  holiness,  but 
also  into  truth.  Probably  pious  men  in  gen- 
eral never  begin  any  work  of  imj)ortance  with- 
out praying  for  grace  and  guidance  ;  but  when 
they  do  so,'^they  do  not  expect  to  be  answered 
with,  for  instance,  the  gift  of  tongues.  They 
ask  for  the  word  of  wisdom  or  the  word  of 
knowledge,  not  for  the  working  of  miracles  ; 
yet  they  look  for  it  from  one  and  the  self- 
same Spirit.  And  surely  we  may  admit  tliat 
that  great  Teacher  of  the  Church  may  teach 
one  in  one  way  and  another  in  another.  It 
may  be  His  will  to  give  one  a  deep  insight  into 
spiritual  mysteries,  but  yet  not  to  give  him  a 
knowledge  of  future  events.  To  another,  at  a 
particular  period  of  the  Church,  or  under  a 
peculiar  dispensation,  he  may  give  tlie  power 
of  prophecy,  or  the  gift  of  tongues,  or  the 
working  of  miracles,  or  such  guidance  and  di- 
rection as  shall  render  his  testimony,  as  to 
things  heavenly,  infalHbly  true.     Are  we  to 


INSPIRATION.  63 

deny  that  God  can  do  so  ?  Or  again — is  it  im- 
possible for  him  to  give  such  a  knowledge  ex- 
cept in  the  way  of  giving  a  higher  degree  of 
sanctification,  purifying  the  soul  from  all  that 
may  darken  the  understanding,  and  so  sharp- 
ening the  spiritual  insight  ?  Such  a  view  of 
things  is  surely  in  direct  opj^osition  to  the  con- 
stant record  of  the  Bible.  If  it  be  true,  it 
must  convict  the  writers  of  the  books  of  the 
Bible  of  false  testimony.  Is  it  not  clearly  set 
doA\'Ti  that  Balaam — that  ''  the  man  of  God, 
who  was  disobedient  to  the  word  of  the  Lord  " 
— that  Jonah,  who  fled  from  God's  presence — 
that  Caiaplias,  even  when  compassing  Christ's 
crucifixion — were  all  empowered  to  speak  of 
future  things,  and  some  of  them  sorely  against 
their  wills  ?  Although  it  is  most  likely  that 
God  would  in  general  use  sanctified  instru- 
ments to  speak  to  man  of  sacred  things,  yet, 
if  the  record  of  the  Bible  be  true,  there  may 
be  a  revelation  to  the  mind,  and  so  through 
the  mouths  of  men,  which  is  not  the  result  of 
•high  sanctification,  of  purifying  the  heart  that 
it  may  see  God.  A  man  may  have  "  the  gift 
of  prophecy  and  understand  all  mysteries  and 
all  knowledge, ' '  may  '  ^  speak  with  the  tongues 
of  men  and  angels,"  and  yet  lack  charity  and 
be  nothiilg. 


64  INSPIRATION. 

21.  And  so,  to  pass  to  another  view  of  the 
question,  Mr.  Morell  argues  that  the  Divine 
or  religious  truth  can  only  be  revealed  to  our 
highest  and  deepest  intuitional  consciousness. 
It  is  not  to  be  received  by  the  senses,  by  the 
understanding,   or  by  the  reason,  but  deeper 
down  still  in  our  inmost  being.     There  is  no 
reason  to  quarrel  with  this  statement  so  far  as 
it   goes.     Its    fault   is,    that   it   is   one-sided. 
*'  When  it  pleased  God  to  reveal  his  Son  in" 
St.   Paul,  doubtless  the  revelation  was  not  to 
the  intellect  only,  but  to  the  very  heart  of 
hearts.      But  there  may  be  abundant  head- 
knowledge  without  any  such  revelation  to  the 
soul  and  spirit.     And  must  we  not  distinguish 
here  between  objective  and  subjective  revela- 
tion ?      Of  course  objective   revelation   must 
suppose  a  subject  ;  that  is  to  say,  if  an  ob- 
ject is  to  be  revealed,  there  must  be  a  subject  by 
which  that  object  may  be  embraced  and  con- 
ceived.    But  is  it  not  plain  to  common-sense, 
setting  aside  all  logical  subtilty,  that  there  may 
be  an  uotward  manifesting  {cpavspoDais,  if  ano- 
KaXvijns  be  ambiguous)  of  God  to  man,  without 
any   inward  reception  of  Him   to  the  soul  ? 
And  if  so,  may  not  a  man  be  taught,  as  Dan- 
iel or  St.  John,  by  a  vision  of  God,  and  yet, 
like  Balaam  or  Jonah,  not  have  his  soul  con 


INSPIRATION.  65 

verted  to  God  ?  He  may  '^  see  the  vision  of 
the  Ahnighty,  falling  into  a  trance,  and  hav- 
ing his  eyes  open  ;"  and  yet  his  heart  may  not 
be  opened  to  know  and  to  love  God.  It  really 
seems  as  if  Mr.  Maurice,  Mr.  Morell,  and  others 
of  similar  sentiments,  deny  the  possibility  of 
this.*  But  on  what  principle  can  it  be  denied, 
except  on  a  principle  which  rejects  all  that  is 
miraculous,  and  which  makes  God,  not  a  Per- 
sonal Being,  but  an  impersonal  influence  ? 

22.  Bat  if  we  believe  that  God  has  in  differ 
ent  ages  authorized  certain  j^ersons  to  commu- 
nicate objective  truth  to  mankind,  if  in  the 
Old  Testament  history  and  the  books  of  the 
prophets  we  find  manifest  indications  of  the 
Creator,  it  is  then  a  secondary  consideration, 
and  a  question  on  which  we  may  safely  agree 
to  differ,  whether  or  not  every  book  of  the 
Old  Testament  was  written  so  completely  un- 
der the  dictation  of  God's  Holy  Spirit,  that 
every  word,  not  only  doctrinal,  but  also  his- 
torical or  scientific,  nmst  be  infallil)]y  correct 

*  Of  course,  Professor  Baden  Powell  must  have  held 
this  impossible,  l)ecaiise  he  held  that  there  was  no  cou- 
taet  point  between  the  spiritual  and  the  physical  worlds. 
The}'  lie,  according  to  him,  in  two  distinct  planes,  which 
can  never  come  in  contact.  But  to  what  must  such  a 
theory  lead  short  of  Materialism  and  Atheism,  in  minds 
of  the  common  stamp  ? 


66  INSPIRATION. 

and  true.     The  whole  collection  of  the  books 
has   been    preserved     providentially    to    the 
Church  as  the  record  of  God's  early  dealings 
with  mankind,  and  especially  with  one  chosen 
race,  as  the  collection  of  the  prophecies  and 
of  the  religious  instruction  which    God   was- 
pleased  to  communicate  to  man  in  the  pre- 
paratory dispensations  of  His  grace  :  and  with 
these  there  is  a  book  of  sacred  psalmody,  em- 
bodying the  religious  experience  of  men  liv- 
ine*  under  the  Theocracv,  some  at  least  of  the 
hymns  contained  in  it  evincing  the  power  of 
prophecy  in  their  writers.     Whatever  conclu- 
sion, then,  may  be  arrived  at  as  to  the  infalli- 
bility of  the  writers  on  matters  of  science  or 
of  history,   still  the .  whole  collection  of   the 
books  will  be  really  the  oracles  of  God,  the 
Scriptures  of  God,  the  record  and  depository  of 
God's  supernatural  revelations  in  early  times 
to  man.     And   we   may  remember  that  our 
Blessed  Lord  quotes  the  Psalms  as  the  Scrip- 
ture, adding,  ''  And  the  Scripture  cannot  be 
broken. ' ' 

23.  It  has  been  already  observed  that  what 
holds  good  of  the  Old  Testament  holds  a  for- 
tiori of  the  New.  If  the  writers  of  it  were 
the  accredited  messengers  from  God  to  man, 
taught  by  Christ,  assured  by  Him  of  the  teach- 


INSPIRATION.  67 

ing  of  His  Holy  Spirit,  sent  to  bring  to  man 
tlie  knowledge  of  God  and  of  His  liigliest 
truths,  we  cannot  doubt  that  tliat  Spirit,  who 
was  to  gnide  them  into  all  trntli,  would  never 
let  them  err  in  things  pertaining  to  God.  Tliis 
is  really  what  we  want.  We  want  to  be  as- 
sured that  we  have  an  infallible  depository  of 
religions  truth.  And  if  w^e  are  satisfied  tliat 
the  Apostles  were  accredited  messengers  for 
delivering  God's  message  and  communicating 
God's  truth  to  the  world,  clearly  we  have  this 
assurance.  It  may,  no  doubt,  be  true  that  all 
ministers  of  Christ  in  all  ages  are  God's  accred- 
ited messengers  ;  but  the  difference  is  this  : 
the  Apostles  had  new  truths  to  deliver  direct 
from  heaven  ;  other  ministers  of  Christ  have 
old  trutlis  to  impress — truths  wdiicli  may  per- 
haps be  new  to  their  hearers,  but  which  are 
old  to  the  Church.  In  the  one  case  tliere  is 
a  direct  commission  with  a  need  of  infalliljility 
in  things  spiritual  ;  in  the  other  the  mission  is 
through  the  intervention  of  others,  and  with 
the  2)ower  of  correcting  errors  by  appealing 
to  the  authority  of  the  written  record. 

If  we  can  establish  this  much  then,  there 
seems  no  need  to  fear  tlie  admission  of  a 
liuman  element,  as  well  as  a  Divine,  in  Scrip- 
ture.    Tlie  Apostles  had  the  treasure  of  the 


68  INSPIRATION. 

Gospel  in  earthen  vessels.  The  Holj  Spirit 
taught  the  Churches  through  the  instrumen- 
tality of  men  of  like  passions  with  ourselves. 
The  difficulty  of  enunciating  a  definite  theory 
of  inspiration  consists  exactly  in  this — in  assign- 
ing the  due  weight  respectively  to  the  Divine 
and  the  human  elements.  A  human  element 
there  clearly  was.  Though  in  instances  like 
those  of  Balaam  and  Caiaphas  we  seem  to  have 
something  more  like  organic  inspiration,  yet 
in  ordinary  cases  God  was  pleased  to  take  the 
nobler  instruments  of  man's  thoughts  and 
hearts  through  which  to  communicate  a  knowl- 
edge of  Himself  to  the  w^orld,  rather  than  to 
act  through  the  organs  of  speech  moving  men's 
mouths  as  mere  machines.  With  all  the 
pains  and  ingenuity  which  have  been  bestowed 
upon  the  subject,  no  charge  of  error,  even  in 
matters  of  human  knowledge,  has  ever  yet 
^  been  substantiated  against  any  of  the  writers 
of  Scripture.  But,  even  if  it  had  been  other- 
wise, is  it  not  conceivable  that  there  might 
have  been  infallil)le  Divine  teaching  in  all 
things  spiritual  and  heavenly,  whilst  on  mere 
matters  of  history,  or  of  daily  life,  Prophets 
and  Evangelists  might  have  been  suffered  to 
write  as  men  ?  Even  if  this  were  true,  we 
need  not  be  perplexed  or  disquieted,  so  we  can 


INSPIRATION.  69 

be  agreed  that  the  Divine  element  was  ever 
snch  as  to  secure  the  infallible  truth  of  Scrip- 
ture in  all  things  Divine. 

24.  All  this,  of  course,  is  applicable  to  ques- 
tions of  23liysical  science.  Scripture  was  not 
given  to  teach  us  science,  but  to  teach  us  re- 
ligion ;  it  may  not  have  been  needful  that  the 
inspired  writers  should  have  been  rendered  in- 
fallible in  matters  of  science,  nor  is  it  at  all 
likely  that  they  should  have  been  directed  to 
teach  to  the  ancient  world  truths  which  would 
anticipate  the  discoveries  either  of  Newton  or 
of  Cuvier.  It  would  have  been  almost  as 
strange  if  they  had  not  used  popular  expres- 
sions in  writing  on  such  sul)jects,  as  if  they 
had  written  not  in  the  tongue  of  their  own 
people,  but  in  a  new  dialect  more  relined  and 
philosophical.  But  may  we  not  ask,  wdiether 
in  this  question  of  physical  science,  as  in 
many  like  things,  scej^tical  writers  have  not 
been  sharp-sighted  on  minute  discrepancies, 
whilst  they  have  been  blind  to  the  great  gen- 
eral harmony  of  truth  ?  It  is  ever  so  ;  each 
petty  diiference  of  date,  each  little  inconsis- 
tency in  two  concurrent  narratives,  every,  the 
slightest  a])])earance  of  doubtful  morality,  any- 
thing like  a  supposed  re})ugnance  to  what  we 
consider  the  necessary  attril)utes  of  the  Most 


70  INSPIRATION, 

High,  have  been  dwelt  on  and  magnified,  and 
used  as  objections  to  the  inspiration  of  Holy 
Writ  ;  whilst  the  general  truth  of  its  history, 
the  j)nrity  and  holiness  of  its  general  moral 
teaching,  the  grandeur  and  sublimity  of  its  doc- 
trines concerning  God,  are  altogether  forgot- 
ten or  concealed.  Yet  is  it  not  true  that,  both 
in  moral  and  in  physical  science,  nothing  short 
of  miraculous  inspiration  can  account  for  the 
superior  knowledge  of  the  writers  of  the  Old 
Testament  com^Dared  with  the  most  enlight- 
ened sages  of  heathen  antiquity  ?  The  Jewish 
philosophers,  like  Philo,  felt  that  tlie  Scrip- 
tures of  their  own  prophets  had  brought  in  sim- 
ple language  to  their  unlettered  fellow-coun- 
trymen moral  and  spiritual  truths,  after  which 
the  Platonists  had  been  "  seeking,  if  haply 
they  might  feel  after  them  and  find  them." 
Greeks,  like  Justin  Martyr,  who  had  tried  one 
school  of  philosophy  after  another,  discovered 
in  the  Gospel  all  that  was  most  valuable  in 
the  teaching  of  all  schools.  And  may  not  we, 
who  have  come  upon  an  age  of  rapid  discovery 
in  physical  science,  confess  that  the  account 
given  of  the  Creator  and  His  works  in  the  Bible 
was  an  anticipation  and  is  an  e]3itome  of  all 
that  has  lately  come  to  light  ?  The  telescope 
has   revealed   to    us   worlds    and   systems  of 


INSPIRATION.  71 

worlds  rolling  in  unl)roken  order  tlirongli  in- 
finity of  space  ;  tlie  microscope  has  shown  us 
living  and  organized  beings  so  small  as  to  be- 
wilder the  mind  with  their  minuteness  as  the 
suns  and  planets  bewilder  it  with  their  vast- 
ness  ;  the  geologist  takes  us  back  through 
countless  ao^es,  the  records  of  which  are  in- 
deliblj  engraven  "  as  with  lead  in  the  rock 
foj-  ever."  And  the  Bible,  but  no  other  an- 
cient book  that  is  written,  had  told  us  that  the 
Being  who  created  all  things  was  such  that  the 
Heaven  and  the  Heaven  of  Heavens  could 
not  contain  Him,  that  He  was  the  High  and 
lofty  One  inhabiting  eternity,  but  that  though 
He  had  His  dwelling  so  high,  yet  He  humbled 
Himself  to  behold  the  things  that  are  in 
heaven  and  earth,  that  a  sparrow  did  not  fall 
without  Him,  that  the  very  hairs  of  man's 
head  were  numbered  by  Him.  Infinite  great- 
ness, infinite  minuteness,  infinity  of  duration, 
infinity  of  action,  eternity  of  past  existence 
and  of  past  operation,  as  well  as  an  eternity 
of  the  future,  are  all  distinctly  predicated  in 
the  Scriptures  of  the  mind  of  Him  who 
made  us  all.  And  here  for  the  first  time, 
now  in  the  nineteenth  century,  we  find  the 
same  infinity  in  heaven  and  in  earth,  and  in 
the  sea,  and  under  the  earth. 


72  INSPIRATION. 

Why,  then,  must  we  be  puzzled  because  some 
recently  discovered  geological  phenomena 
seem  hard  to  reconcile  with  a  few  verses  in  one 
chapter  of  G-enesis  ?  Are  we  to  forget  the 
marvellous  harmony  between  God's  word  and 
His  works,  which  a  general  view  of  both  con- 
vinces us  of,  because  there  are  some  small 
fragments  of  both,  which  we  have  not  yet 
learned  to  fit  into  each  other  ?  Nay  !  even  here, 
we  may  fairly  say,  that  the  harmony  already 
found  is  greater  than  the  as  yet  unexplained 
discord.  For,  putting  aside  all  doubtful  inter- 
pretations and  difiicult  questions  concerning 
the  six  days  of  creation  and  the  like,  these 
two  facts  are  certain  ;  all  sound  criticism  and 
all  geological  inquiry  prove  them  alike  ;  viz., 
first,  that  the  original  creation  of  the  universe 
was  at  a  period  indefinitely,  if  not  infinitely, 
distant  from  the  present  time  ;  and  secondly, 
that  of  all  animated  beings,  the  last  that  came 
into  existence  was  man.  Geology  has  taught 
us  both  these  facts  ;  but  the  first  verse  of  Gen- 
esis clearly  teaches  the  first,  and  the  twenty- 
sixth  verse  teaches  the  second. 

To  touch  but  for  a  moment  on  one  other 
subject  which  has  been  so  strongly  pressed  of 
late,  the  uniform  prevalence  of  law,  not  only 
in  things  inanimate,  but  where  there  is  life 


INSPIRATION,  78 

and  even  reason  and  morality — can  an}i;liing 
be  more  consistent  than  this  with  the  whole  of 
the  Old  Testament  ?  Indeed  its  peculiar  teach- 
ing from  first  to  last  may  be  said  to  have  been 
that  God  is  a  God  of  order  ;  that  He  has  im- 
pressed His  law  on  all  creation  ;  that  all  things 
serve  Plini,  all  things  obey  Him  ;  that  to 
break  laws,  whether  moral  or  physical,  is  in- 
evitably to  entail  suffering  ;  and  that  even  ra- 
tional and  spiritual  beings,  even  in  their  ra- 
tional and  S23iritual  natures  and  capacities,  are 
subject  to  laws  which  cannot  be  broken  ;  that 
the  sins  of  the  fathers  go  down  in  sin  and  sor- 
row to  the  children  ;  and  that  even  repent- 
ance, though  it  may  save  .the  soul,  cannot  undo 
the  sin  or  avert  the  suffering.  There  is  no- 
where in  creation  or  in  history  written  more 
plainly  the  record  of  order  and  law. 

25.  Surely  such  thoughts  as  these  seem  fit 
to  satisfy  us,  that  God's  works  rightly  read 
are  not  likely  to  contradict  God's  word  rightly 
interjDreted.  There  will  be  for  a  time,  per- 
haps for  all  time,  apparent  difficulties.  When 
new  questions  arise,  at  first  many  will  feel  that 
it  is  hopeless  to  attempt  to  solve  them.  Some 
will  despair,  some  will  try  to  smother  inquiry  ; 
some  will  rush  into  Atheism,  and  others  will 
fall  back  into  superstition.      Patience  is  the 


74  INSPIRATION. 

proper  temper  for  an  age  like  our  own,  which 
is  in  many  ways  an  age  of  transition.  The 
discoveries  of  Galileo  seemed  more  alarming 
to  his  contemporaries  than  any  discoveries  in 
geology  or  statistics  can  seem  to  ns.  We  see 
no  difficulty  in  Galileo's  discoveries  now.  Such 
things,  then,  are  j)robabl3^  the  proper  trials  of 
our  faith.  Sober  views,  j)atience,  prayer,  a 
life  of  godliness,  and  a  good  conscience,  will, 
no  doubt,  keep  us  from  making  shipwreck  of 
faith.  What  now  seems  like  a  shadow  may 
only  be  the  proof  that  there  is  a  light  behind 
it.  And  even  if  at  times  there  should  come 
shadows  seeming  like  deej)  night,  we  may  hope 
that  the  dawn  of  the  morning  is  but  the 
nearer. 


SCRIPTURE,  AND  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 


CONTENTS. 


Sect.  1.  The  Alleged   Vaeiations  in  the   Interpbbtation  of 

SCKIPTTJRE,  p.  425. 

1.  Introductory  comments  and  definitions, 

2.  Present  attitude  and  expectations. 

3.  Amount  of  varying  interpretations  much  exaggerated— as  shown 

by  firs-t,  Ancient  and  modern  versions ;  secondly,  Comparison 
of  earlier  and  later  expositions. 

4-  ^^^^f^  ^"^  historical  mode  of  Interpretation  adopted  from  the 

5.  Recapitulation. 

Sect.  2.  The  Chaeactebistics  of  Sceiptuee,  p.  445. 

6.  Differences  of  interpretation  in  details. 

7.  This  diversity  in  unity  to  be  accounted  for-I.  By  the  difference 

of  the  Bible  from  every  other  Book.  II.  By  the  fact  that  Scrip- 
ture often  involves  more  than  one  meaning:  as  shown  bv  m 
Applications  of  prophecy,  (2)  Types,  (3)  Deeper  meanings,  even 
in  historical  passages.    III.  By  the  fact  that  Scripture  is  divinely 

8.  Examination  of  the  assertions  of  opponents  concerning  the  Insni- 

ration  of  Scripture,  as  regard s,,^rs<,  the  Testimony  of  Scripture 
rhnvnf/''?L''*'w*;°  i/self;  s^co,irt///,  the  Statements  of  the  Early 
Church  ;  thirdly,  the  Subjective  testimony. 

9.  Affirmative  observations  upon  Inspiration— Considerations  con- 

cerning,.^r.s«,  Its  Mode ;  secondly,  its  Limits ;  thirdly,  its  Degree. 

10.  Recapitulation. 

Sect.  3.  Geneeal  Rules  op  Inteepeetation,  p.  480. 

11.  Preliminary  comments-Duty  of  Prayer— Necessity  for  candor. 

12.  Rules  for  the  Interpretation  of  Scripture— First  TMle—hiterwret 

gramniatically-^-i.&m^\QS.  Second  B,u\&- Interpret  histori- 
cally-Examples  Third  Bii\e-l7iteri}ret  Contextually-Exam- 
ples.  Fourth  F.nle— Interpret  minutely— Examples.  Failure  of 
these  rules  in  cases  of  difficulty.  Gradual  emergence  of  supple- 
mentary rules.    Fifth  Rule  -Interpret  according  to  the  analogy 

13.  Concluding  observations. 

Sect.  4.  The  Application  op  Sceiptuee,  p.  513. 

14.  Application  of  Scripture  considered  in  reference  to,  I.  Prophecy 

aacl  lypology.  II.  Second  and  deeper  meanings.  III.  Practical 
and  special  deductions. 

Sect.  5.  Geammae  and  the  Laws  op  the  Lettee,  p.  522, 

15.  Introductory  remarks. 

16.  General  character  of  the  language  of  the  New  Testament,  as  com- 

pared with  earlier  and  later  Greek. 

17.  Peculiarities  as  shown  in  details,  especially  in  reference  to  (1)  the 

.^j^ticle,  (2)  Substantives,  (3)  Verbs,  (4)  Prepositions,  (5)  Parti- 

18.  Conclusion. 


SCRIPTURE,  AND  ITS  INTER- 
PRETATION. 


I. 

1.  It  can  hardly  be  considered  strange  that 
great  differences  of  opinions  honld  exist  respect- 
ing the  interpretation  of  Scripture.  When  we 
consider  the  nature  of  the  Sacred  Writings, 
their  number,  their  variety,  the  different  ej^ochs 
to  which  they  belong,  and  the  vast  period 
of  time  over  which  they  extend,  we  can  hardly 
be  surprised  to  find  the  opinions  concerning 
the  interpretation  of  the  Volume  into  which 
they  are  collected  not  only  to  be  various, 
but  even  conflicting.  When  we  turn  from 
tlie  outward  to  the  inward,  and  j^onder  over 
"  that  inexhausti])le  and  infinite  character"  of 
the  Sacred  Writings,  which  even  the  better 
portion  of  our  opponents  are  not  unwilling  to 
concede, — when  we  observe  that  ''  deptli  and 
inwardness,"  which,  it  has  been  rightly  con- 


J 

78    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

sidered,  require  something  corresponding  in 
the  interpreter  himself, — when  we  reveren- 
tially recognize  throughout  the  Yohime  refer- 
ences alike  to  the  past,  the  present,  and  the  fu- 
ture ;  teachings  in  history  only  partly  realized, 
lessons  in  proj)hecy  ' '  not  yet  learned  even  in 
theory,"  germs  of  truth  which,  we  are  told, 
have  yet  to  take  root  in  the  world, — when  w^e 
consider  all  this,  are  we  to  wonder  that  differ- 
ences of  o]3inion  exist  concerning  the  inter- 
pretation of  a  volume  so  ancient,  so  wondrous, 
and  so  multiform  ? 

n  would  indeed  be  strange  if  it  had  been 
otherwise  ;  it  would  be  a  phenomenon  in  the 
literary  or  mental  history  of  Christianity  not 
easy  to  account  for,  if  expounders  of  Scrip- 
ture had  been  found  always  accordant  in  their 
views  ;  nay,  it  may  even  be  considered  a  sub- 
ject for  surprise,  though  for  thankfulness,  that 
the  differences  of  opinion  about  the  interpre- 
tation of  a  volume  such  as  we  have  described 
are  not  greater  than  we  find  tliem  to  be. 

When,  however,  we  are  thus  speaking  of 
the  differences  of  opinion  respecting  the  inter- 
pretation of  Scripture  (and  we  are  using  the 
language  of  opponents),  let  us,  from  the  very 
outset,  agree  to  avoid  all  ambiguities  in  lan- 
guage.    Let  us  be  careful  not  to  fall  into  an 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION,    79 

error  wliicli  we  may  fairly  impute  to  those 
witli  whom  we  are  contending, — the  error,  to 
choose  the  mildest  expression,  of  using  terms 
of  a  vague  and  undefined  character,  and,  as 
the  sequel  will  show,  of  a  somewhat  conven- 
ient elasticity.  What  do  we  mean  by  differ- 
ences respecting  the  interpretation  of  Scrip- 
ture ?  We  may  mean  two  things.  Either  we 
may  mean  that  there  have  been  differences  of 
opinion  about  the  meanings  of  the  actual  words 
of  Scripture,  or  we  may  mean  that  there  have 
been  differences  of  opinion  about  the  manner 
in  which  those  meanings  have  been  obtained. 
We  may  include  both  if  we  choose  in  the  same 
forms  of  words,  but  in  so  doing  let  us  not  fail 
to  apprise  ^tlie  reader,  and  in  conducting  the 
argument  let  us  act  with  fairness.  Let  us  be 
careful  to  recognize  the  clear  logical  differ- 
ence between  these  two  meanings,  and  avoid 
that  really  culpable  method  of  dealing  with  a 
momentous  subject  which  does  not  scruple  to 
mix  uj)  illustrations  or  arguments  derived  from 
one  of  its  aspects  with  those  which  really  and 
plainly  belong  to  the  other.  There  may  liave 
been  from  the  very  first  many  methods  of 
interpreting  Scripture  :  allegory  may  have 
prevailed  in  one  age,  mysticism  in  another  ; 
scholastic  methods  of  interpretation  may  have 


80    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION, 

been  succeeded  by  rhetorical,  and  these  again  ^ 
may  both  have  given  place  to  methods  in 
which  grammar  and  history  may  have  borne  a  :■, 
more  prominent  part.  All  this  may  have  been 
so,  but  it  still  does  not  necessarily  follow  that 
the  meanings  actually  assigned  to  any  given 
text  have  been  as  manifold  or  as  discordant  as 
the  methods  which  may  have  been  adopted  to 
obtain  them.  The  modes  and  principles  of 
interpretation  may  have  been  very  diiferent, 
and  yet,  in  the  main,  they  may  have  led  to 
very  accordant  results.  Such  a  probabiHty) 
however,  is  now  somewhat  studiously  passed 
over  in  silence,  or  mentioned  only  to  be  dis- 
missed as  unworthy  of  serious  consideration. 
The  object,  we  fear,  is  to  create  anxiety  and 
uneasiness,  to  unfix  and  to  unloosen,  to  awa- 
ken a  general  feeling  of  distrust  in  current 
interpretations,  and,  in  the  case  of  doctrinal 
statements  and  every  form  of  exposition  that 
involves  a  reference  to  the  analogy  of  faith, 
to  arouse  even  hostility  and  antagonism.  This 
has  been  done  of  late,  as  we  have  already  im- 
plied, by  a  judicious  combination  of  two  meth- 
ods of  proceeding, — on  the  one  hand,  by  calhng 
attention  to  the  discordances  of  interpretation 
in  a  few  extreme  cases  where  such  discordance 
is  sure  to  be  a  maximum  ;    on  the  other,  by 


SCRIP  TUBE :  ITS  INTERPRET  A  TION.    8 1 

dwelling  exclusively  on  the  varieties  of  the 
different  systems  and  methods  of  inteq)reta- 
tion,  and  leaving  it  to  be  inferred  that  the  re- 
sults arrived  at  are  as  various  and  diversified 
-as  the  methods  by  whicli  they  have  l)een  ob- 
tained. In  a  word,  such  a  phenomenon  as  a 
Catholic  interpretation,  substantially  the  same 
under  all  systems,  but  varied  only  in  details  or 
ap])lication,  is  assumed  to  be  an  exegetical  im- 
possibility. The  true  state  of  the  case  we  are 
told  is  this, — that  Scripture  has  had  every  pos- 
sible variety  of  meaning  assigned  to  it,  that  it 
has  been  understood  to  say  this  to  one  age  and 
that  to  another,  that  all  hitlierto  lias  been  con- 
flict or  uncertainty.  AVe  learn,  however,  that 
now  a  better  era  is  dawning  ;  that  a  funda- 
mental principle,  viz.,  that  Scripture  has  one 
meaning  and  one  meaning  only,  has  at  length 
clearly  l)een  made  out  ;  and  that  a  little  "  free 
handling,"  a  few  assumptions,  and  a  free  use 
of  a  so-called  "  verifying  faculty,"  will  finally 
adju^st  all  difficulties  and  discordances  in  the 
interpretation  of  the  Book  of  Life. 

There  is  ()l)viously  something  very  attrac- 
tive in  all  this.  There  is  a  fascination  in  the 
whole  procedure  that  imperfectly  disci})lined 
or  willingly  sce])tic;il  minds  find  it  impossible 
to  resist.  There  is  tlie  clmnn  of  the  alleged 
6 


82    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

disco  \^ery  that  criticism  at  last  has  made,  the 
attractiveness  of  the  generahzation,  the  variety 
of  the  modes  of  applying  the  principle  so  as 
to  meet  all  needs,  whether  of  the  reader,  the 
preacher,  the  missionary,  the  teacher,  or  the 
interpreter, — and  then  the  retrospect,  the  back- 
ward look  of  serene  triumph  over  the  accnmn- 
lated  errors  and  prejudices  ^of  eighteen  ^long 
Christian  centuries,  all  chased  away  by  the 
brightness  of  this  second  Reformation  and 
the  "  burst  of  intellectual  life"  that  is  at  last 
becoming  visible  above  the  clouded  horizon  of 
Scriptural  interpretation.  One  topmost  stone, 
and  the  monument  of  our  exegetical  successes 
must  be  pronounced  complete.  Philosophy 
and  Theology  claim  of  us,  we  are  told,  as  of 
value  to  themselves  a  history  of  the  past.  Be 
it  so.  Let  us  take  the  pen  of  the  historian  and 
sit  down  and  trace  the  record  of  our  own  men- 
tal supremacy  in  a  history  of  the  prejudices 
and  errors  of  the  Exegesis  of  the  past.  Let  us 
show  by  this  tacit  com]3arison  how  ^ '  gi-eat 
names  must  be  accounted  small,"  how  few 
ever  ' '  bent  their  mind  to  interrogate  the 
meaning  of  words,"  how  men  who  were  ac- 
counted benefactors  of  the  human  race  have 
yet  only  left  to  us  the  heritage  of  erring  fan- 
cies and  party-bias, — let  us  write  the  history 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    83 

of  all  this  littleness,  confusion,  and  bondage 
to  the  letter,  and  tlie  fabric  of  onr  own  great- 
ness, harmony,  and  intellectual  freedom  will 
appear  by  the  contrast  only  the  more  stately 
and  unique. 

Such  is  the  dream  of  the  present.  Such, 
stated  in  no  exaggerated  or  unkindly  terms,  is 
the  course  which  men  whose  general  goodness 
and  high  principles  we  have  no  cause  to  doubt 
or  deny  are  now  inviting  iis  to  follow.  What 
are  we  to  say  of  all  this  ?  The  comment  rises 
to  the  lips,  but  we  suj^press  it.  We  may  feel, 
perhaps,  that  as  in  Corinth  of  old  so  now  in 
nineteenth-century  England,  vain  knowledge 
may  puff  up,  yet  remembering  that  "  love  edi- 
lieth,"  we  sit  by  silent  and  wondering,  even 
though  the  lire  is  kindling  within,  and  silence 
is  becoming  a  pain  and  a  grief  to  us.  At  first 
perhaps  we  prepare  to  answer  the  call  to  join 
the  wise  and  tranquil  few,  who,  kn<>wing  tliat 
the  Eternal  Spirit  has  been  ever  present  with 
the  Chui'ch,  and  that  what  things  were  writ- 
ten aforetime  were  written,  not  f(>r  our  con- 
tempt but  for  our  learning,  smile-  pensively 
at  these  childish  exultations  and  straw-woven 
crowns,  and  see  in  tliem  only  one  more  of  tlie 
premature  triumplis  that  have  been  claimed 
for  some  shifting  foi-m  of  the  errors  or  liere- 


8  4    SCRIP  T  URE :  ITS  INTERPRET  A  TION. 

sies  of  the  time.  We  feel  tempted  to  join  this 
quiet  compaiiy,  and  cahnly  to  smile  as  thej 
alone  can  smile  whose  feet  stand  within  the 
sheltering  walls  of  the  City  of  God,  and  whose 
faith  is  that  which  was  not  only  delivered  bnt 
handed  down  to  the  saints  in  each  age  of  the 
Church  of  Christ.  What  can  we  do  but  smile, 
when  we  recognize  old  quibbles  and  difficul- 
ties all  mustered  up  again,  disguised  in  new 
trappings,  and  arranged  in  new  combinations, 
— but  yet  the  same,  the  very  same  that  have 
been  dispersed  a  hundred  times  over,  and 
which  the  very  generation  to  which  we  now 
belong  will  see  dispersed  again,  though  it  may 
be  to  ally  themselves  hnally  with  powers  and 
principles  of  which  at  present  they  are  only  per- 
mitted to  act  as  the  scout  and  the  courier  ? 

But  with  this  last  thought  the  smile  fades 
away.  When  we  remember  that  the  forms  of 
error  which  of  late  have  been  reappearing 
among  us  may  belong,  consciously  or  uncon- 
sciously, to  the  great  apostasy  of  the  future, — 
when  we  observe  how  they  instinctively  asso- 
ciate themselves  with  masked  or  avowed  deny- 
ings  of  the  Divinity  of  our  blessed  Lord,  and 
of  the  full  efficacy  of  His  sacrifice, — when  we 
mark  how  their  vanities  and  self- confidences 
bear  a  strange  family  likeness  to  that  Pelagian 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    85 

pride  in  the  perfectibility  of  our  corrupted  na- 
ture wliicli  tears  open  the  wounds  of  a  cruci- 
hed  Lord  more  lieartlesslj  than  the  liands  that 
first  inflicted  tlieni, — when  we  ponder  over 
tliat  puffed  up  and  unyoked  spirit  of  the  day 
that  is  now  calling  on  us  to  clear  away  the  re- 
mains of  dogmas  and  controversies,  and  when 
we  see,  as  we  must  see,  with  a  shudder,  that 
it  is  but  the  harbinger  of  him  who  is  to  set  him- 
self against  everything  ''  that  is  called  God  or 
that  is  worshipped  "  (2  Tliess.  ii.  4), — then  it 
does  seem  our  duty  to  play  our  part  in  the 
great  controversy,  to  quit  ourselves  like  men, 
and  to  strive  with  all  Christian  earnestness, 
with  stem  brow  yet  wdth  true  and  loving  heart, 
to  secure  the  endangered  souls  of  our  own  time 
and  age,  and  to  bring  them  back  into  the  City 
of  God. 

2.  The  position  of  the  defender  of  the  faith 
in  the  present  day  is  that  of  one  whose 
home  and  citizenship  is  in  the  City  ''  that 
lieth  four-square,"  whose  builder  and  whose 
maker  is  God.  The  storm  of  battle  has  often 
raged  round  those  massive  walls,  wild  rout  and 
turmoil  have  often  striven  to  shake  those  solid 
gates.  Passwords  have  been  tried  ;  treachery 
has  played  its  dastardly  part, — but  all  stands 
firm  and  sure.     The  rising  sun  that  smites  on 


86    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

the  broad  front  of  those  fair  walls  and  towers, 
beholds  them  as  stately  in  their  strength  and 
their  beauty  as  they  were  ever  of  old  ;  the 
shadows  they  cast  when  day  declines  are  as 
many  and  as  lengthened  as  they  were  of  yore. 
Who  within  wonld  wish  to  see  a  stone  dis- 
placed, who  wonld  fain  see  one  battlement  laid 
low  ?  Perhaps  none  who  are  really  and  truly 
within  the  circuit  of  those  sheltering  walls. 
But  there  are  voices  without  that  we  know 
full  well,  voices  of  those  with  wdiom  we  have 
dwelt  as  friends,  whose  God  has  been  our  God, 
and  whose  Lord  has  been  our  Lord, — men 
who  went  from  among  us  on  strange  mis- 
sions, and  are  come  back  to  tell  us  strange  tid- 
ings, and  to  bid  us  do  strange  deeds.  That 
beleaguering  host  whose  flaunting  standards  we 
can  see  on  every  wooded  knoll  around,  and 
whose  open  or  covert  assaults  our  fathers  and 
forefathers  have  experienced  so  often,  and  re- 
sisted so  successfully  and  so  long,  — that  motley 
eager  host  they  tell  us  is  not  composed  of  foes 
but  of  friends  and  well-wishers,  changed  by 
civilization  and  the  glory  of  human  develop- 
ment, eager  to  meet  us  as  kindred  and  brothers 
if  we  will  but  remove  the  envious  barriers  that 
separate  us,  relics  of  a  religious  feudalism,  as 
they  term  it,  long  passed  away.     Shall  creeds 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    87 

separate  brothers  ?  Shall  doctrines  divide  those 
whom  Tinity  of  race  and  shared  civilizations 
plainly  declare  to  be  one  and  inseparable  ? 
Shall  we  chnrlishlj  strive  any  longer  to  stint 
the  growth  of  the  ideal  man  ?  Shall  the  ori- 
ent and  glowing  fnture  be  darkened  w^ith  jeal- 
ousies of  sects  and  rivalries  of  religions  ?  ''  We 
are  couriers,"  they  imj)etnously  cry  aloud  ; 
^'  ambassadors,  friends  of  both,  friends  of 
truth,  friends  of  Christ.  Unbar,  then,  these 
en^-ious  gates  ;  down  with  these  unfriendly 
walls  ;  let  us  learn  from  each  other  the  great 
lesson  of  mutual  concessions,  and  so  at  last  re- 
alize the  great  hope  of  the  future,  the  fabled 
restitution  of  theologians,  and  at  last,  all  in  fra- 
ternal triumph,  merge  into  the  one  great  fam- 
ily of  Truth  and  of  Love. ' '  Such  are  the  voices 
now  sounding  in  our  ears  ;  voices  that  the  young 
and  the  generous,  as  well  as  the  godless  and  the 
worldworn,  give  ear  to  with  ready  sympathy. 
Eut  shall  the  tnie  defenders  of  the  ark  of  their 
God,  that  ark  of  the  New  Covenant  wherein 
lie  the  written  words  of  life,  yield  it  and 
themselves  up  to  this  stratagem  which  one 
''  whose  time  is  short  "  has  put  into  the  hearts 
of  unconscious  instruments  ?  l^ever.  God 
defend  us  from  such  fearful,  such  frantic  dis- 
loyalty !     God  indeed  forbid  that,  in  any  sense, 


88    8CRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

however  modified,  it  should  hereafter   be  the 
boast  of  the  spirits  of  perdition,  that  it  was- 
with  the  City  of  the  liills  even  worse  than  it  was- 
with  a  city  of  the  plain, — that  the  host  wound 
round  it,  that  sounding  brass  brayed  forth  and 
eager  voices  shouted,  and  that,  mined  by  trai- 
torous occupants,  wall  and  tower  fell  flat  as 
those  of  Jericho,  and  fell  never  to  rise  again  I 
Such,  it  would  seem,  is  the  allegory  of  our 
own  times — such  no  overdrawn  picture  of  the 
exact  attitude  in  which  true  believers  now  ap- 
pear to  stand.     We  are  called  upon  by  specious- 
words  to  give  up  every  defence  which    the 
mercies  of  God  have  permitted  to  be  reared  up 
around  us  ;  and  our  reward  is  to  be  a  bond- 
age, to  which  the  bondage  of  the  worst  age  of 
the  Church  of  Rome  would  be  found  light  and 
endurable.     There  is  no  bondage  like  that  of 
scepticism.     There  is  no  intolerance  more  in- 
tolerable than  that  of  those  who  are  themselves- 
the  servants  of  a  hard  master.    It  may  be  a  bond- 
age  diJSerent    to    bondages   of    the    past    in 
its  mode  of  being  brought  about,  but  it  is  no 
less  complete  and  coercive.     It  is  the  bondage 
of  contempt  and  of  scorn.     Do  we  doubt  it  ? 
Are  there  not  writings  of  our  own  times,  writ- 
ings that  claim  scholars  and  ministers  of  the 
Gospel  for  their  authors,  that  show,  only  too 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION,    89 

painfully,  what  we  have  to  expect  if  we  allow 
snch  to  be  leaders  of  thought  among  us,   if 
wall  and  tower  are  to  be  thrown  down  to  let 
such  men  come  in  and  have  the  rule  over  us  ? 
Granted  that  there  may  be  numerous  excep- 
tions, that  there  may  be  those  who,  even  while 
we  are  compelled  to  number  them  among  our 
secret  foes,  we  may  be  free  to  own  have  many 
kindly  and  elevated  sympathies, — granted  that 
there  may  be  silver  sounds  heard  amid  all  this 
clanging  brass,   yet  does  not   common  sense, 
does  not  history  itself  tell  us,  that  the  voices 
of  this  better  part  will  be  the  first  to  be  si- 
lenced ;    that  their  kindly  idealisms   will  be 
rudely  swept  aside  to  make  room  for  varied 
and  repulsive  forms  of  aggressive  materialism  ; 
that  they  will  themselves  be  the  earliest  vic- 
tims of  the  Frankenstein  their  own  hands  have 
helped    to    shape   into   existence  ?      Let   the 
thoughtful  reader  pause  only  for  a  moment  to 
muse  upon  some  of  the  present  aspects  of  mod- 
em society  as  revealed  by,  as  commented  on, 
and  sometimes  even  as  defended  by,  our  pub- 
lic papers,  and  then  answer  to'  his  own  heart 
what  he  thinks  must  be  the  issue  if  laxity  of 
religious  thought  seriously  increase  among  us. 
Yice  will  borrow  its  excuses  from  scepticism  ; 
lawlessness  of  act  will  become  the  natural  se- 


90    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION 

quel  of  lawlessness  of  thought  ;  and  the  end 
will  be,  no  noble,  colossal,  heavenward-looking, 
ideal  man,  bnt  a  grovelling  satyr,  the  slave  of 
his  own  appetites,  and  the  vassal  of  his  own 
abominations. 

Bnt  we  must  pass  on  to,  or  rather  return  to, 
the  subject  which  lies  more  immediately  before 
us.  Enough,  perhaps,  has  been  said  to  show 
that  there  can  be  no  safe  compromise,  no  over- 
liberal  parleying  with  those  without,  be  they 
the  kindliest  or  the  most  silver-tongued  of  the 
children  of  men.  The  believer  of  the  present 
day  must  put  himself  in  the  attitude  of  an  op- 
ponent, kind  indeed  it  may  be,  and  large  in 
heart  and  sympathies,  ready  and  anxious  to 
rescue,  prompt  to  spare, — yet  an  opponent  ; 
one  who,  when  asked  to  give  up  old  princi- 
ples, may  not,  for  the  sake  of  others,  wholly 
refuse  to  hear  the  nature  of  the  demand,  but 
who  hears  it  with  a  full  knowledge  of  the  true 
attitude  and  posture  of  those  by  whom  it  is 
urged.  We  are  asked  especially  to  give  up  old 
principles  in  the  interj^retation  of  the  Word  of 
God.  Some  concession,  we  are  warned,  is  al- 
most imperatively  demanded.  We  ask  why. 
We  bid'  our  opponents  state  their  reasons  for  a 
demand  so  sweej)ing  and  comprehensive.  One 
of  these  reasons  we  have  heard  already,  and  we 


SCRIPTURE:  IW  INTERPRETATION.    91 

have  already  observed  that  it  involves  an  am- 
biguity. We  are  told  that  the  differences  re- 
specting the  interpretation  of  Scri]>tnre  are 
such  that  they  show  that  prejudice  rather  than 
principle  is  the  true  mainspring  of  Scriptural 
exegesis.  Pictures  are  held  up  to  us  of  the 
successive  schools  of  interpreters,  their  follies 
and  their  fallacies,  their  bondage  to  the  influ- 
ences of  the  age  in  which  they  lived,  their  hos- 
tihty  to  all  intellectual  freedom.  Be  it  so  ; 
but  is  it  proved  that  the  interpretations  which 
they  actually  advanced  are  as  varied  as  their 
methods  of  procedure  are  so  confidently  alleged 
to  be  i  Whether  a  great  deal  too  much  has  not 
been  :said  even  on  this  subject,  whether  the 
diversities  or  antagonisms  of  early  systems  of 
explaining  Scripture  have  not  been  greatly 
exaggerated,  is  a  quer>tion  into  which  here  we 
will  not  enter.  Our  inquiry  is  simply,  whether 
the  differences  of  interpretation  are  at  all  more 
than  the  nature  and  importance  of  the  subject- 
matter  would  lead  us  to  expect,  and  whether  a 
great  deal  that  has  been  said  about  the  differ- 
ences of  interpretation  does  not  wholly  belong 
to  the  differences  of  the  modes  of  procedure. 
It  is,  of  course,  quite  nat»^iral  and  conceivable 
that  the  spirit  of  each  age  may  have  swayed 
teacher  and  preacher  more  to  this  method  than 


92    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

to  that  ;  that  passing  controversies  may  have 
left  their  traces,  and  that  declarations  which 
seemed  of  great  moment  to  one  generation 
may  not  have  been  foimd  equally  so  to  another. 
All  this  may  be  so,  bnt  with  this  we  are  now 
only  partially  concerned.  If  we  were  endeav- 
oring to  form  an  estimate  of  the  variety  of 
deductions  that  have  been  made  from  the 
words  of  Scripture  in  different  ages  of  the 
Church,  or  were  discussing  the  varying  appli- 
cations that  the  same  sentiment  has  been  found 
to  bear,  much  that  has  been  said  on  the  subject 
might  pass  unchallenged.  We  should  probably 
account  for  these  varied  forms  of  application 
or  deduction  on  different  principles  to  our  op- 
ponents ;  we  might  see,  for  instance,  in  all 
this  diversity  of  application  only  evidences  of 
"  the  manifold  wisdom  of  God,"  and  of  that 
hidden  life  with  all  its  varying  aptitudes  to 
human  needs  which  we  know  to  be  in  the 
Written  Word.  Our  opponents,  on  the  con- 
trary, might  see  in  it  only  evidences  of  the 
folly,  ignorance,  prejudice,  or  bad  faith  of 
successive  expositors  :  we  might  differ  widely 
in  our  manner  of  accounting  for  these  differ- 
ent applications  of  •Scripture,  but  we  might 
to  a  great  extent  agree  as  to  their  number  and 
variety.     This,  however,  is  not  the  question 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION-    98 

between  us.  What  we  are  now  told  is  not 
merely  that  the  applications  or  adaptations  of 
Scripture  have  been  very  varied,  bnt  that  the 
difference  of  actual  meaning  assigned  to  the 
w^ords  of  Scripture  by  expositors  of  different 
ages  is  so  suspiciously  excessive,  that  the  duty 
of  purging  our  minds  from  past  prejudices 
is  imperative,  and  that  Scripture  must  hence- 
forth be  explained  on  sounder  principles. 
The  one  true  meaning  must  be  discovered  and 
adopted,  the  many  disregarded  or  rejected. 
The  first  question  between  us,  then,  is  a  ques- 
tion of  amount  and  of  degree.  Our  opponents 
assert  that  Scripture  has  had  so  many  mean- 
ings, often  too  so  hostile  and  suicidal,  that 
it  presents  one  meaning  to  the  Frenchman, 
another  to  the  German,  and  another  to  the 
Englishman.  We  are  asked  if  this  is  not  in  it- 
self an  utter  absurdity,  and  if  it  is  not  time  to 
enter  upon  some  more  reasonable  course.  That 
assumed  reasonable  course  is  sketched  out  ; 
canons  of  interpretation  are  laid  down  ;  ap- 
peals are  not  wanting  to  current  prejudices  ; 
disinclination  or  inaptitude  for  that  wrestling 
with  the  Word  of  Clod  which  marked  earlier 
and  better  ages  of  the  Church  is  dealt  gently 
with  ;  disregard  of  the  great  exegetical  writ- 
ings of  the  past  is  not  only  excused  but  com- 


94    STimP'TUliE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.' 

mended  ;  we  are  advised  wholly  to  trust  to 
ourselves,  and  are  cheered  by  the  assurance 
that  '^  if  we  will  only  confine  ourselves  to  the 
plain  meaning  of  w^ords  and  the  study  of  their 
context,"  we  may  beneficially  dispense  with  all 
the  expository  labors  of  the  jDast  or  of  the 
present.  Such  is  the  modem  mode  of  dealing 
with  one  of  the  most  momentous  subjects  of 
our  own  times,  and  with  which  23ersonal  lioK- 
ness  and  man's  salvation  are  more  intimate- 
ly connected  than  wdth  any  other  that  can 
be  specified.  Is  it  unfair  to  characterize  the 
whole  as  nothing  more  than  positive  asser- 
tions, resting  on  ambiguities  of  language,  or 
on  the  assumed  identity  of  things,  logically 
different,  and  supported  by  covert  appeals  to 
the  idleness,  vanity,  and  self-sufiiciency  of  the 
day? 

3.  We  revert,  however,  to  the  preliminary 
question  before  us.  Are  the  dijfferences  of 
meaning  that  have  been  assigned  to  Scripture 
such  in  amount  as  they  are  said  to  be,  and 
such  as  to  demand  the  reliabilitation  of  Scrip- 
tural interpretation  which  is  now  jDroposed  ? 
Are  they  such  that,  as  it  has  been  asserted, 
Scripture  bears  an  utterly  different  meaning  to 
men  of  different  ages  and  nations  ?  Assuredly 
not.     No  statement  seems  more  completely  at 


JSOMIPTLIBE:  ITS  INTERPRKJ ATION.    95 

vai'iance  with  our  general  Cliristiaii  conscious- 
ness ;  no  assertion  can  more  readily  be  dis- 
approved when  we  come  to  details.  These, 
however,  can  never  be  made  palatable  to  the 
general  reader,  nor  are  they  commonly  convinc- 
ing, unless  carried  out  much  further  than  would 
be  possible  in  an  Essay  of  this  nature.  To  prove 
clearly  and  distinctly  that  there  is  not  this 
great  amount  of  discordance  in  the  interpreta- 
tions of  Scripture,  it  would  be  necessary  to 
compare,  and  that  not  in  a  few  selected  cases, 
but  in  a  j)ortion  of  Scripture  of  some  length, 
the  results  arrived  at  by  connnentators  of 
different  ages  and  countries.  Less  than  this 
would  fail  to  convince  ;  for  in  the  case  of  a 
few  prerogative  instances,  which  would  be  all 
we  should  have  space  for,  the  feeling  is  ever 
apt  to  arise  that  lists  equally  telling  and  con- 
rincing  could  be  made  out  on  the  other  side 
We  have,  therefore,  as  it  would  seem,  lit- 
tle left  us  than  to  meet  assertion  by  counter- 
assertion,  and  leave  each  reader  to  ascertain  for 
himself  on  which  side  the  truth  lies, — whether 
the  differences  in  the  interpretations  of  Scrip- 
ture (exce2)t  in  a  comparatively  few  cases)  have 
been  thus  excessive,  or  whether  there  has  not 
been  a  very  considerable  amount  of  accordance 
in  general  matters,  and  variations  only  in  de 


96    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

tails.  Those  who  are  acquainted  with  the  sub- 
ject, and  have  had  experience  in  referring  to  ex- 
pository treatises  belonging  to  different  ages  and 
countries,  will  have  no  difficulty  in  pronounc- 
ing which  is  the  true  state  of  the  case,  and 
whether  assertion  or  counter-assertion  is  to  be 
deemed  most  worthy  of  credit.  As,  however, 
the  general  reader  is  not  always  likely  to  have 
it  in  his  power  to  decide  between  the  two  state- 
ments, and  as  the  mere  denial  of  the  major 
in  an  opponent's  syllogism  is  never  satisfactory 
without  some  reasons  being  assigned,  we  will 
mention  one  or  two  general  considerations 
which,  though  not  amounting  to  a  positive 
proof  that  Scrij^ture  has  not  been  interpreted 
as  diversely  as  has  been  asserted,  may  yet  ren- 
der it  probable  that  such  is  the  case,  and  supply 
some  grounds  for  the  counter-assertion  above 
alluded  to. 

In  the  first  place,  we  may  perhaps  with  jus- 
tice appeal  to  the  Ancient  Versions,  especially 
when  combined  with  some  of  the  best  Mod- 
ern Versions,  as  tending  to  show  that  the 
amount  of  variety  in  interpretation  is  not  so 
great  as  has  been  imagined.  Let  us  take,  for 
example,  seven  of  the  best  Ancient  Versions 
of  the  JSTew  Testament — the  Syriac  (Peshi- 
to),  the  Old  Latin  (as  far  as  it  has  been  ascer- 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    97 

tained),  tlie  Yulgate,  the  Gothic,  the  Coptic, 
the  Ethiopic  (Pell  Piatt's),  and  the  Armenian, 
and  with  them  let  us  associate  the  Authorized 
English  Version  and  Luther's  German  Version, 
and  then  proceed  to  inquire  what  general  opin- 
ion a  comparison  of  the  characteristics  of  these 
Versions  leads  us  to  form  as  to  the  question 
of  a  prevailing  unanimity,  or  a  prevailing  dis- 
cordance, of  interpretation,  as  far  as  it  can  be 
evinced  bj  a  Version.    Xow,  admitting  on  the 
one  hand  that  there  may  be  such  relations  ex- 
isting between  some  of  these  Versions,   that 
each  can  hardly  be  considered  an  independent 
witness, — that  the  Vulgate,   for  example,   is 
but  an  amended  form  of  the  Old  Latin,  that 
the  Ethiopic  sometimes  seems  to  indicate  de- 
pendence on  the  Syriac,   that  the  Armenian 
was  retouched  at  a  late  j)eriod,  and  possibly 
that  the  Vulgate  was  in  the  hands  of  the  re- 
viser,— admitting  all  this,  and  making  also  a 
deduction   for  the  influence  of  the   Vulgate, 
and,  perhaps,  to  some  small  extent,  of  the  Sy- 
riac over  the  two  modern  Versions,  we  may 
still  most  justly  point  to  these  nine  Versions, 
of  ages  and  countries  so  dilferent  and  distant, 
as  evincing  an  unanimity  in  their  renderings, 
not  only  of  general  but  even  of  disputed  pas- 
sages, far  beyond  what  could  have  been  ex- 
7 


98    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

pected  a  priori^  or  can  in  any  way  be  ac- 
counted for  by  the  admissions  we  have  ah-eady 
made.  If  it  be  said  this  must  necessarily  be 
the  case  in  Versions  which  are  all  strictly  lit- 
eral in  their  character,  these  two  remarks  may 
be  made  by  way  of  rejoinder  :  first,  that  the 
very  fact  that  nine  Versions  of  different  ages 
and  countries  should  agree  in  this  im^^ortant 
featnre,  that  not  one  of  them  should  in  any 
respect  be  paraphrastic,"^  and  that  some,  as  for 
instance  the  Old  Latin,  should  almost  be  bar- 
barous in  their  exactness,  does  seem  to  show 
that  not  only  in  later  ages,  but  even  in  the 
earliest,  the  very  letter  of  Scripture  was  re- 
garded as  of  the  utmost  importance,  and 
treated  with  the  most  scrupulous  accuracy. 
Where  versions  were  so  punctilious,  it  does 
not  seem  natural  to  expect  that  interpretation 
would  have  been  very  wild  or  varied,  except 
when  it  was  allowed  to  degenerate  into  appli- 
cations, or  busied  itself  with  minutiae  and  de- 
tails. Secondly,  it  may  be  added,  that  even 
the  most  literal  Versions  involve  interpreta- 

*  It  may  be  noticed  that  we  have  specified  the  Ethiopic 
Version  as  that  edited  by  Mr.  Pell  Piatt.  The  Ethiopic 
found  in  Walton's  '  Polyglot '  often  degenerates  into  a 
.paraphrase,  especially  in  difficult  passages.  The  Peshito 
is  sometimes  idiomatically  free,  but  never  paraphrastic. 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  mTHRPRETATTON,    99 

• 
tion  in  tlie  fullest  sense  of  the  word,  especially 
in  the  opinions  they  necessarily  express  on  the 
connexion  of  clauses,  and  in  the  renderings  of 
words  of  disputed  meaning.  A  good  transla- 
tion is  often  the  very  best  of  eonnnentaries, 
and  it  was  a  full  appreciation  of  this  fact  that 
led  a  venerated  scholar  and  divine,  when  asked 
what  he  judged  to  be  the  best  commentary  on 
the  Kew  Testament,  to  name  the  Vulgate. 
The  general  unanimity  of  the  early  as  well  as 
later  Versions  is  thus  a  testimony,  at  any  rate, 
of  some  little  weitrht,  in  favor  of  the  belief 
that  the  amount  and  degree  of  differences  of 
interpretation  in'  earlier,  when  compared  with 
later  ages,  have  been  much  overstated. 

Still  it  may  be  urged,  that  whatever  may  be 
the  case  with  Versions,  it  is  perfectly  certain 
that,  in  the  results  at  which  commentators  of 
different  ages  have  arrived,  there  is  a  vast 
amount  not  only  of  variety  but  of  antagonism. 
In  reference  to  a  certain  number  of  difficult 
passages  tliis  may  be  true  ;  if,  however,  this 
be  intended  as  a  general  statement  referring 
to  Scriptural  interpretation  at  large,  it  must  be 
regarded  as  open  to  considerable  doubt.  Let 
us  endeavor  to  show  this  in  the  folk^wing 
way.  It  is  said  that  there  is  an  increasing 
agreement  between  recent  German  expositors, 


100    SCRIP  TUBE:    ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

and  it  is  also  implied  tliat  the  results  at  which 
they  have  arrived  are  far  more  consonant  witli 
trnth  than  any  that  have  preceded.  Of  these 
expositors,  De  Wette  and  Meyer  are  often 
mentioned  with  resj^ect  by  modern  writers. 
Let  US  agree  to  take  them  as  two  fair  repre- 
sentatives of  the  exegesis  of  onr  own  times. 
Let  us  now  go  to  a  remote  past,  and  choose 
two  names  to  compare  with  them  as  represen- 
tatives of  the  interpretation  of  a  former  day. 
Let  us  take  for  example  Chrysostom  and  The- 
odoret.  They  belonged  to  an  age  sufficiently 
distant  ;  they  shared  in  its  feelings  and  sym- 
pathies ;  they  took  part  in  its  controversies. 
They  were  not  specially  in  advance  of  their 
own  times.  One  of  them  had,  what  many 
will  judge  to  be  not  always  compatible  with 
calmness  of  interpretation,  a  strongly  rhetori- 
cal bias  ;  the  other  did  not  escape  some  suspi- 
.cion  of  heresy.  Such  as  they  were,  or  have 
been  judged  to  be,  let  us  compare  them,  in 
some  portion  of  Scripture  (St.  Paul's  Epistles 
for  example),  on  which  all  have  written,  with 
the  two  modern  commentators  above  specified, 
and  state  what  seem  to  be  the  general  results 
of  the  comparison.  We  naturally  set  out  with 
the  expectation  of  finding  very  great  diversity. 
If  all  that  has  been  said  on  this  subject  be 


SCRIPTURE:    ITS  mTERPRETATION.    101 

true  ;  if  the  fourteen  centuries  wliicli  lie  be- 
tween the  two  pairs  of  men  be  as  plentiful- 
ly diversified   as  they  are  said  to  have  l)een 
by  changes    in  methods  of    interpretation,— 
changes,  too,  asserted  to  have  been  gradually 
leading  us  up  to  more  perfect  principles  of  in- 
terpretation,—we  must  expect  to  find  a  very 
great  amount  of   discordance  l)etween  them. 
Yet  what  do  we  discover  Avhen  we  actually  in- 
stitute the  comparison  ?     To  speak  very  o-en- 
erally,  it  would  seem  to  be  as  follows.     There 
will  be  found  in  the  first  place  a  considerable 
amount  of  variety  in  matters  of    detail,   the 
older  interpreters  more  commonly  giving  what 
may  be  termed  an  objective  reference  to  words 
and  expressions,  where  the  two  modern  writ- 
ers will  be  found  agreeing  to  adopt  a  more 
subjective  view.     In  the  second  place,  differ- 
ences will  be  observed  in  the  treatment  of  doc- 
trinal passages  ;  the  older  interpreters  usually 
expounding  them  with  reference  to  the  great 
controversies  of  their  own  times,  and  to  points 
of  polemical  detail  ;  the  modern  interpreters 
usually  trying  to  generalize,   and  not  unfre- 
quently  to  dilute  and  explain  away,  whenever 
doctrinal  statements  appear  to  assume  a  very 
distinctive  or  definite  aspect.     In  a  word,  the 
tendency  of  the  two  earlier  writers  is  to  what 


102    SCRIPTURE:    ITS  INTERPRETATION, 

is  objective  and  s^Decial  ;  of  the  two  later  to 
what  is  subjective  and  general.  These  distinc- 
tions will  certainly  be  observed,  especially  in 
the  two  departments  above  alluded  to — matters 
of  detail  and  matters  of  doctrine,  and  may  per- 
haps be  deemed  sufficient  to  justify  the  recog- 
nition of  some  clear  lines  of  demarcation  be- 
tween earlier  and  more  modern  interpretation. 
When,  however,  these  points  of  diiference  are 
set  aside,  there  w^ill  be  found  remaining  in  the 
great  bulk  of  Scrij)ture,  and  in  all  general  pas- 
sages, an  amount  of  accordance  so  striking  and 
so  persistent,  that  it  can  only  be  accounted  for 
by  the  assumption  that  these  four  able  exposi- 
tors all  instinctively  recognized  one  common 
and  sound  principle  of  Scriptural  interpreta- 
tion. The  j^recise  nature  of  that  princi]3le 
w411  become  aj)]3arent  as  we  advance  further  in 
our  investigations. 

4.  Believing  that  these  remarks  are  just, 
and  cajDable  of  being  fully  substantiated,  we 
may  claim  to  have  at  least  made  it  probable, 
that  the  extent  of  the  alleged  differences  in  the 
interpretation  of  Scripture  between  our  own 
times  and  the  past  has  been  unduly  exag- 
gerated. Here  we  might  pause  as  far  as  the 
present  ]3ortion  of  our  subject  is  concerned. 
It  may  be  well,  however,  to  take  one  step  fur- 


SCRIPTURE:    ITS  INT?JRPRETATION.    103 

ther,  and  show,  what  fairly  can  be  shown,  that 
from  the  very  earliest  times,  the  literal  and 
historical  method  of  interpreting  Scripture, 
now  so  often  claimed  as  the  distinguishing 
characteristic  of  our  own  times,  has  ever  been 
recognized  in  the  Church  as  the  true  method 
on  man's  side  of  interpreting  the  Oracles  of 
Ood.  On  this  subject,  owing  to  the  small 
amount  of  exact  knowledge,  even  among  more 
professed  students,  and  to  the  currency  which 
a  few  popular  comments  readily  obtain  among 
those  whose  acquaintance  with  these  ancient 
writers  must  ever  be  second-hand,  many  ques- 
tionable statements  are  allowed  to  pass  unchal- 
lenged. It  would,  perhaps,  seem  hopeless  to  at- 
tempt to  say  one  word  in  favor  of  the  method  of 
interpretation  adopted  by  Orlgen.  Every  writ- 
er of  the  day  uses  that  great  name  to  illustrate 
w^iat  is  to  be  regarded  as  wild  and  fanciful. 
And  yet,  what  is  the  opinion  which  any  real 
student  of  Origen's  exegetical  works  would 
certainly  give  us  ?  What,  for  instance,  would 
be  the  statement  of  an  unl)iassed  scholar  who 
had  thoughtfully  read  what  remain  to  us  of 
his  commentaries  on  St.  Matthew  and  St. 
John  ?  Would  he  not  tell  us  that  in  these  por- 
tions of  his  works,  whatever  may  have  been 
his  theories  elsewhere,  Origen  rarely  failed  to 


104    SGBTPTUBE:    IT8  INTERPRETATION. 

give  the  first  place  to  the  simple  and  literal  in- 
trepretation,  and  that  his  divergencies  into  al- 
legory far  more  often  deserve  the  name  of 
applications  than  of  actual  expositions  ?  Al- 
legory seems  really  and  j)rimarily  to  have  com- 
mended itself  to  Origen  as  the  readiest  meth- 
od of  dealing  with  those  difficulties  which  his 
acute  mind  almost  too  quickly  recognized  as 
transcending  human  reason  and  explanation. 
The  remark  of  one  who  has  carefully  read  and 
well  used  one  portion  of  his  works — the  ex- 
positor Liicke — is  probably  not  wholly  unjust, 
that  a  tendency  to  rationalize,  of  which  Origen 
himself  was  unconscious,  may  to  a  great  de- 
gree account  for  his  bias  to  allegory  and  mys- 
tical modes  of  interpretation,  whenever  the 
difficulties  of  the  passage  seemed  to  rise  above 
the  usual  level.  Where  there  was  no  neces- 
sity for  this,  where  there  were  no  historical 
details  which  seemed  at  issue  with  human  rea- 
son, or  with  received  views  of  morality  and 
justice,  Origen  shows  plainly  enough  what 
method  of  interpreting  the  Word  of  God  he 
deemed  to  be  the  true  and  correct  one.  We  may 
abundantly  verify  this  from  his  extant  writ- 
ings. We  may  also  further  judge  from  frag- 
ments preserved  in  Catenae  (his  scattered  com- 
ments,   for   example,    on  the  Epistle  to   the 


SCRIPTURE:   ITS  INTERPRETATION.    105 

Ephesians)  what  were  really  liis  leading  prin- 
ciples ;  and  we  may  fairly  ask  if  tliey  were  so 
very  different  from  tlie  principles  of  inter- 
preting Scripture  which  all  parties,  friends 
and  foes,  seem  now  in  the  main  agreed  in  re- 
garding as  reasonable  and  correct. 

We  might  extend  these  remarks  almost  in- 
definitely by  discussing  the  true  nature  of  the 
leading  methods  of  interpreting  Scripture — 
these  methods  which  we  are  told  are  so 
strangely  discordant — in  the  case  of  each  one 
of  the  more  distinguished  expositors  of  differ- 
ent ages  of  the  Church.  We  might  show,  for 
instance,  that  no  amount  of  strong  polemical 
bias  prevented  Cyril  of  Alexandria  from  ex- 
pounding portions  of  Scrij^ture  (the  Gospel 
of  St.  John  for  example)  with  w^hat,  even  in 
our  own  critical  days,  must  be  called  felicity 
and  success.  We  might  make  it  clear  that 
the  rhetorical  turn  of  Chrysostom's  mind  never 
prevented  him  from  fully  discussing  verbal  dis- 
tinctions, analyzing  the  meanings  of  prejDOsi- 
tions,  estimating  the  force  of  compound  forms, 
and  so  placing  before  his  reader  as  calm,  clear, 
and  persuasive  a  view  of  the  passage  under 
consideration  as  we  may  find  in  the  best  speci- 
mens of  modern  interpretation.  We  might 
turn  to  the  West,  and  in  spite  of  some  grow- 


106    SCRIPTURE :    ITS  INTERPRET  A  TION. 

ing  disposition  to  admit  more  generally  those 
studied  distinctions  in  reference  to  threefold 
or  fourfold  senses  of  Scripture  which  Origen 
bequeathed  to  his  successors,  we  might  still 
ap]3eal  to  Augustine  as  a  writer,  whose  special 
inter^n'etations  can  never  be  sj^oken  of  without 
res^^ect,  and  whose  perceptions  of  the  inner 
mind  of  Scripture,  and  of  the  true  bearing  of 
its  deeper  declarations,  remain  to  this  very 
hour  unequalled  for  their  ^perspicuity  and 
truth.  Nay,  we  might  even  show  that  the 
studied  recognition  of  several  senses  in  Scrip- 
ture was  rather  a  form  of  application  than 
of  deiinite  and  genuine  interpretation.  We 
might  even  go  onward,  and  pass  into  those 
ages  which  have  become  very  bywords  for  per- 
verted interpretation  of  Scripture — the  ages  of 
the  earlier  and  later  schoolmen — and  even  in 
them,  amid  subtile  and  narrow  logic  on  this 
side,  and  a  wild  and  speculative  idealism  on 
that,  we  should  have  no  difficulty  in  showing 
that  there  was  a  via  media  of  sound  principles 
of  interj^retation  which  was  both  recognized 
and  proceeded  on.  It  is  j)erfectly  true  that 
at  this  period  not  only  the  earlier  threefold 
and  fourfold  senses  of  Scripture  were  re-as- 
serted and  re-applied,   but  that  even  seven- 


SCRIPTURE:   ITS  INTERPRETATION.    107 

fold,  eightfold,*  and,  if  we  choose  to  press  the 
words  of  Ei-igena,  infinite  senses  of  Scripture 
were  admitted  bj  mediaeval  interpreters  ;  but 
it  is  also  perfectly  true  and  demonstrable,  from 
passing  comments  and  cautions,  that  the  sim- 
ple, plain,  and  literal  sense  was  always  ad- 
mitted to  be  the  basis,  and  that  other  forms  of 
interpretation  were  commonly  regarded  more 
in  the  light  of  deductions  and  apj^lications. 
The  rule  laid  down  by  Aquinas  was  clear 
enough,  and  expresses  fairly  the  general  feel- 
ing of  the  interpreters  of  his  own  time, — '^  In- 
omnibus  quae  Scriptura  tradit,  pro  fundamen- 
to  est  tenenda  Veritas  historica,  et  desuj^er 
spirituales  expositiones  fabricandee"  {SmnTiia 
Theol.  Pars.  1,  Qu.  102,  Art.  1)  :  the  literal 
and  historical  came  first,  the  rest  were  forms 
of  application.  It  is  not,  however,  merely  from 
passing  comments,  or  from  asserted,  but  real- 
ly neglected  principles,  but  from  the  general 
tenor  of   the  better  exj^ositions  of  the  time 

*  The  enumeration  may  amuse  the  reader  :  (1)  Sensus 
literalis  vel  historicus  ;  (3)  allegoricus  vel  parabolicus  ; 
(3)  tropologicus  vel  etymologicus  ;  (4)  anagogicus  vel 
analogicus  ;  (5)  typicus  vel  exeniplaris  ;  (G)  auaphoricus 
vel  proportionalis  ;  (7)  boarcademicus  vel  primordialis 
{i.e.  (juo  ipsa  principia  rerum  comparantur  cum  beatitu- 
dine  ieterna  et  tota  dispeusatione  salutis)  ;  see  Bibl.  Max. 
Pair.  torn.  xvii.  p.  315  seq.     (Ludg.  1677.) 


108    SCRIPTURE:   ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

that  tlie  full  force  of  the  above  remarks  will 
best  be  felt.  Let  a  fair  and  intelligent  reader 
consent  to  give  a  little  time  to  some  of  the  in- 
terpretations of  difficnlt  passages  in  St.  Paul's 
Epistles  as  put  forward  by  Lombard  or  Aqui- 
nas, and  then  tell  us  his  impressions.  We  will 
venture  to  state  Avhat  his  report  would  be, — 
that  it  was  a  matter  of  surprise  to  him,  in  an 
age  which  has  ever  been  a  very  byword  for 
subtilties  and  pedantry,  to  find  such  a  large 
amount  of  reasonable  and  intelligent  interpre- 
tation of  the  Word  of  God. 

5.  To  gather  up,  then,  our  preceding  com- 
ments, may  we  not  fairly  say, — -JiTst^  that  much 
that  has  been  said  about  the  extent  and  variety 
of  interpretations  of  Scripture  is  exaggerated  ; 
secondly^  that  even  the  various  methods  of  in- 
terpretation— which,  when  it  serves  a  purpose, 
om*  opponents  regard  as  meaning  the  same  as 
the  results  arrived  at — may  in  many,  perhaps 
most,  cases  be  regarded  as  modes  of  applying 
or  expanding  the  primary  sense,  rather  than 
of  eliciting  substantive  and  independent  mean- 
ings ;  thirdly,  not  only  that  God  has  never 
left  Himself  without  a  witness,  and  that  in 
every  age  there  have  been  a  few  faithful  repre- 
sentatives of  faithful  principles  of  interpreta- 
tion,  but  further-,   that   there  has  been  from 


SClilFTUEE :  ITS  INTERPliETATION.    109 

the  veiy  earliest  times,  not  only  in  tlieorj  but 
in  practice,  a  plain,  literal,  and  historical  mode  U 
of  interpreting  Scripture  ;  and  finally,  that 
there  may  be  traced  s(j  great  an  identity  in  the 
results  arrived  at  by  suc3essive  interpreters, 
that  we  have  full  warrant  for  using  the  term 
Catholic  in  reference  to  a  far  larger  portion  of 
what  may  be  considered  current  orthodox  in- 
terpretations than  the  mere  popular  disputant 
is  at  all  aware  of  l  Let  the  incpiire  be  put  with 
all  simplicity  to  those,  whether  in  tliis  country 
or  abroad,  who  have  made  Ancient  Versions 
and  expositors  their  study,  and,  however  dif- 
ferent their  opinions  may  be  on  other  points, 
on  this  they  will  be  agreed, — that  there  is  such 
a  Concordia  disco rs  in  the  results  obtained, 
that  in  very  many  passages  we  can  produce  in- 
terpretations which  may  stand  even  the  test 
of  Vincent  of  Lerins,  and  may  justly  be 
termed  the  traditional  inter2:>retations  of  the 
Church  of  Christ. 

We  know,  of  course,  how  these  statements 
both  have  been  and  will  be  disposed  of  by  the 
impatient  and  the  coniident.  Tt  will  be  said, 
prol)al)ly,  that  granting  merely  for  the  sake  of 
argument,  tliat  there  is  that  species  of  concord 
of  interpretation  in  many  important  passages, 
it  has  been  only  the  result  of  traditional  preju- 


110    SCRIP  TURE :   ITS  INTERPRETA  TION. 

dices  from  whicli  it  is  now  our  duty  to  make 
ourselves  free.  It  will  be  added  that  any  form 
of.  such  consent  is  in  itself  snsjDicions,  and  that 
if  onr  intuitions  rnn  counter  to  it  we  are  at 
once  to  listen  to  the  voice  of  reason  within  us^ 
and  reject  the  interpretation  of  every  Church 
and  every  age  of  the  world,  if  it  does  not  ap- 
prove itself  to  our  own  convictions.  Brave 
and  buoyant  in  our  own  self-esteem,  we  shall 
perhaps  never  pause  to  ask  how  far  the  so- 
called  voice  of  reason  may  not  be  the  voice  of 
prejudice, — how  far  convictions  may  not  be 
merely  the  results  of  secret  influences  within, 
and  of  some  half-consciousness  that  what  we 
reject  bears  aspects  or  involves  conclusions 
sadly  at  variance  with  our  habits  or  our  pro- 
pensions.  We  may  at  last  perceive  that  it  is 
the  Word  of  God  in  its  dreaded  function  of 
searching  the  intents  of  the  heart  that  is  now 
being  brought  home  to  us,  and  in  our  very 
dismay  and  perplexity  we  may  have  felt  forced 
to  come  to  the  determination  that  every  inter- 
pretation, be  it  of  Church  or  of  Council,  that 
makes  us  thus  tremble  for  ourselves,  both  must 
be  and  shall  be  either  rejected  or  ignored. 
Thus,  perhaps,  will  all  that  has  been  urged  be 
disposed  of.  Be  it  so.  There  is  a  proud  and 
confident  spirit  abroad  ;  there  is  a  love  of  self, 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPIIETATION.    Ill 

self  in   its   more  purely  intellectual  aspects, 
above  measure  painful  and  revolting  ;    there 
are  forms  l)earing  the  names  of  moral  good- 
ness and  freedom,  and  yet  involving  the  denial 
of  the  essence  of  both,  that  bring  an  Apos- 
tle's predictions    sadly  and    strangely  to  our 
thouglits, — and  we  feel  it  nnist  be  so,  and  that 
there  are  some  whose  ears  must  be  and  will 
be  turned  away  from  the  truth.      Yet  there 
are  others — especially  the  young,  the  ardent, 
the  inex^^erienced — to  whom  what    has  been 
thus  far  urged  may  not  have  been  urged  in 
vain.     To  them  our  arguments  are  mainly  ad- 
dressed, to  them  we  are  speaking,  for  them  we 
are  pleading.      ''  Young  man,   true   in    heart 
and  earnest  in  spirit,  honest  searcher,  anxious 
yet  prayerful  inquirer,   let    not    thy  eyes  be 
holden  by  proud,  unkindly  hands,  judge  for 
thyself.     Beheve  not  every  one  that  tells  thee 
that  the  records  of  the  Church  are  scribbled 
over  with  every  form  of  strange,  idle,  and  con- 
ventional interpretation  of  the  Word  of  God. 
Judge  for  thyself,  but  judge  righteous  judg- 
ment.   If  there  be  fuller  concords  in  tlie  voices 
of  the  past  than  thou  hast  believed,  close  not 
thine  ears  to  them  because  as  yet  they  sound 
not  fully  harmonious  tp  thee.     Wait,  ponder, 
pray  :    ere  long,   perchance    thine  own  voice 


112    SCRIPTURE :  ITS  INTERPRET  A  TION. 

will  spontaneously  blend  with  what  thou  hear- 
est  ;  thou  thyself,  by  the  grace  of  God,  may 
at  length  hear  sounding  round  thee,  and  by 
thine  own  experience  make  others  hear  with 
thee,  the  holy  accords  and  harmonies  of  the 
deep  things  of  the  Word  of  God, ' ' 

§  2. 

6.  We  now  pass  naturally  onward  to  another 
portion,  or  rather  to  another,  and  that  at  first 
sight  an  oj^posed,  aspect  of  our  present  subject. 
Hitherto  we  have  shown  not  only  that  the 
amount  of  the  differences  of  interpretation  has 
been  clearly  over-estimated,  but  even  that  the 
true  and  honest  method  of  interpreting  the 
Word  of  God — the  literal,  historical,  and 
grammatical — ^^has  been  recognized  in  every 
age,  and  that  the  results  are  to  be  seen  in  the 
agreement  on  numberless  passages  of  impor- 
tance that  may  be  found  in  expositors  of  all 
periods  ;  in  other  words,  that  the  illuminating 
grace  of  God  has  ever  been  with  His  Church. 
This  being  so,  it  is  but  waste  of  time  to  con- 
sider the  causes  that  have  been  alleged  for  the 
existence  of  the  multitude  of  interiDretations, 
when  that  multitude  has  been  proved  to  a  great 
extent  to  be  imaginary.     We  will  not,  then, 


SCRIPTUR?: :  ITS  INTERPRETATION,    113 

pause  to  discuss  the  amount  of  varying  inter- 
pretations that  have  been  ascribed,  whetlier,  on 
the  one  hand,  to  rhetoric  and  desires  to  edify, 
or,  on  the  other,  to  party  feeling  and  efforts 
to  wrest  the  meanings  of  Scripture  to  different 
sides.     We  deny  not  that  both  have  produced 
some  effect  on  the  interpretation  of  Scripture. 
We  do  not  deny  that  the  Christian  preacher 
may  have  often  urged  meanings  that  do  not  lie 
in  the  words,  and  that  these  may  have  been 
adopted    by  contemporaries  and    echoed  and 
reproduced  by  those  that  have  followed.     We 
deny  ]iot,  again,  that  the  natural  meaning  of 
many  texts  may  have  been  j^erverted  by  preju- 
dice on  one  side  or  other,  and  that  traces  of  this 
may  still  remain  in  some  of  the  current  inter- 
pretations of  our  own  times.    All  this  we  deny 
not,  but,  on  the  other  hand,  we  confidently  as- 
sert that  the  effects  have  l)een  limited,  and  that 
all  the  assumptions  that  the  contrary  has  been 
the  case  fall  with  the  fallen  assumption,  viz., 
that  the  discordance  of  Scripture  interpreta- 
tions is  excessive,  and  that  all  methods  hither- 
to  adoj^ted  have    been  uncertain   or  untrust- 
worthy 

J>ut  we  now  come  to  wliat  at  first  sight  mav 
appear  a  reversed  aspect  of  our  subject.    While, 
on  the  one  hand,  we  consider  it  proved  that 
8 


114    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

there  has  been  from  the  first  a  substantial 
agreement,  not  only  in  the  mode  of  interpret- 
ing Scripture,  but  in  many  of  its  most  impor- 
tant details,  we  are  equally  i^repared,  on  the 
other  hand,  to  recognize  the  existence  of  great 
differences  of  opinion  about  the  meanings  of 
individual  passages,  and  even  in  reference  to 
the  methods  by  which  these  meanings  may  be 
best  obtained.  N^o  one  who  has  had  any  ex- 
perience in  the  interpretation  of  Scrij^ture  can 
with  honesty  assert  the  contrary.  It  may  be 
true  that  in  the  great  majority  of  all  the  more 
important  passages  careful  consideration  will 
show  that  what  logic,  grammar,  and  a  proper 
valuation  of  the  significance  of  words,  seem  to 
indicate  as  the  principal  and  primary  meaning 
of  the  passage,  will  be  found  to  have  been  re- 
cognized as  such  ages  before,  and  has  substan- 
tially held  its  ground  to  our  own  times, — still 
experience  teaches  us  that  there  is  a  very 
large  residuum  of  less  important  passages  in 
which  interpreters  break  up  into  groups,  and 
in  which  the  expositor  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury has  to  yield  to  the  guidance  of  princi]3les 
perhaps  but  recently  recognized,  yet,  from 
their  justice  and  truth,  of  an  influence  and  au- 
thority that  cannot  be  gainsaid.  There  are, 
indeed,  even  a  few  cases,  but  confessedly  un- 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    115 

important,  where  the  modern  interpreter  has 
to  oppose  himself  to  every  early  Version  and 
every  patristic  commentator,  and  where  it  is 
almost  certain  he  is  right  in  so  doing.  Let  the 
connexion  of  the  concluding  portion  of  Gal. 
iv.  12  be  cited  as  an  example.  Such  instances 
are,  however,  very  rare,  and  need  hardly  be 
mentioned  save  to  show  that  principles  can 
never  be  dispensed  with,  and  that,  though  we 
yield  all  becoming  deference  to  interpretations 
in  which  antiquity  is  mainly  agreed,  we  yet 
by  no  means  pledge  ourselves  unreservedly  to 
accept  them.  All  these  differences,  then,  in 
the  interpretations  of  individual  passages,  we 
frankly  recognize  ;  nay  more,  we  may  in  many 
cases  admit  that  there  are  clearly  defined  differ- 
ences in  the  method  of  interpreting — perhaj)S 
an  extended  context.  Last  of  all,  it  is  not  to 
be  supposed  that  there  is  a  somewdiat  large 
class  of  passages  so  far-reaching,  so  inchisive, 
and  so  profound,  that  not  only  are  all  the  bet- 
ter interpretations  remarkal)le  for  their  varied 
character,  but  for  their  appearing,  perhaps  each 
one,  to  represent  a  portion  of  the  true  meaning, 
but  scarcely,  all  of  them  together,  what  our 
inner  soul  seems  to  tell  us  is  the  complete  and 
ultimate  meaning  of  the  w^ords  that  meet  the 
outward  eye. 


116    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

7.  We  are  tlius  admitting  the  existence  of 
diversity  of  inter]3retation,  especially  in  indi- 
vidual passages  and  details,  as  readily  and  as 
frankly  as  we  have  argued  for  the  existence  of 
a  far  greater  prevailing  unity  both  in  the  mean- 
ings themselves,  and  the  methods  of  arriving 
at  them  in  all  more  important  passages,  than  is 
willingly  recognized  by  jDopular  writers.  The 
question  then  naturally  arises,  how  do  we  ac- 
count for  these  apparently  reversed  aspects  ? 
How  can  we  in  the  same  breath  assert  ]3re vail- 
ing unity,  and  yet  admit  diversity  ?  How  do 
we  account  for  a  state  of  things  which  in 
Sophocles  or  Plato  would  be  pronounced  in- 
credible or  absurd  ?  Our  answer  is  of  a  three- 
fold nature.  We  account  for  this  by  ob- 
serving, First^  that  the  Bible  is  different  to 
every  other  book  in  the  world,  and  that  its  in- 
terpretation may  well  be  supposed  to  involve 
many  difficulties  and  diversities.  Secondly^ 
that  the  words  of  Scripture  in  many  parts 
have  more  than  one  meaning  and  application. 
Thirdly^  that  Scripture  is  inspired,  and  that 
though  written  by  man  it  is  a  revelation  from 
God,  and  adumbrates  His  eternal  plenitudes 
and  perfections. 

On  each  one  of  these  forms  of  the  answer  we 
will  make  a  few  observations. 


SiJRIPTUHE:   ITS  INThmPRETATTON.    117 

1.  On  the  first,  2)erliapR,  little  iiioi'e  need 
be  said  than  has  been  incidentally  bronght  for- 
ward in  earlier  parts  of  this  Essay.  It  is,  in- 
deed, most  nnreasonable  to  compare,  even  in 
externals,  the  Bible  with  any  other  book  in  the 
world.  A  collection  of  many  treatises,  writ- 
ten in  many  iifferent  styles,  and  at  many 
different  ages,  can  never  be  put  side  l)y  side 
with  the  works  of  a  single  author,  nor  will  any 
canons  of  interpretation  which  maybe  just  and 
reasonable  in  the  latter  case,  be  necessarily 
applicable  to  the  former.  What,  for  instance, 
can  realh'  be  more  strange  than  to  lay  down 
the  mle  that  we  are  to  interpret  the  Scripture 
like  any  other  book,  when,  in  tlie  merest  rough 
and  outside  view,  the  Scripture  presents  such 
striking  differences  from  any  book  that  the 
world  has  ever  seen  ?  The  strangeness  becomes 
greater  when  we  look  inward,  and  observe  the 
varied  nature  of  the  contents, — prose  and  poe- 
try, history  and  prophecy,  teachings  of  an 
incarnate  God,  and  exhortations  and  messages 
of  men  to  men.  How  very  unreasonable  to 
insist  on  similar  modes  of  interpreting  what 
our  very  opponents  rightly  term  "  a  world  by 
itself  " — a  world  from  which  foreign  iniiuences 
are  to  be  excluded — and  any  other  documents 
or  records  that  have  come  from  the  hand  of 


118    SCRIPTURE:   ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

man  !  How  can  we  witli  justice  require  that 
amount  of  exegetical  agreement  in  tlie  former 
case  that  might  naturally  be  looked  for  and 
demanded  in  the  latter  ?  Plow  very  reasonable, 
on  the  other  hand,  is  the  supposition  that  in 
the  inter23retation  of  a  collection  of  treatises  of 
such  varied  and  momentous  import  we  may 
have  to  I'ecognize  both  unities  and  diversities, 
— unities  as  due  to  the  illuminating  grace  of 
the  one  and  self -same  Spirit  similarly  vouch- 
safed to  all  meek  and  holy  readers  of  Scripture 
in  every  age  of  the  Church, — diversities  as  due 
to  the  profundity  and  variety  that  must  ever 
mark  the  outpourings  of  the  manifold  wisdom 
of  God  !  It  seems,  indeed,  idle  to  dwell  upon 
what  is  thus  obvious  and  self-evident  ;  but  it 
has  been  rendered  necessary  l)y  what  we  are 
obliged  to  term  the  unfairness  of  our  oppo- 
nents. At  one  time,  when  the  argument 
seems  to  require  it,  the  Scripture  is  considered 
as  a  single  book,  to  be  dealt  with  like  other 
books,  subject  to  the  same  critical  canons, 
amenable  to  the  same  laws  of  interpretation  : 
at  another  time  it  emerges  to  view  as  a  collec- 
tion of  records,  unconnected  and  discordant, 
which  it  is  desirable  to  keep  thus  divided,  that 
they  may  be  the  more  readily  disposed  of  ; 
and,    whenever   it   may  seem   necessary,   the 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    119 

more  successfully  pitted  against  one  another 
in  contradictions  and  antagonisms. 

II.  We  pass  onward  to  our  second  form  of 
answer.  Here  we  find  ourselves,  as  might 
have  been  foreseen,  in  undisguised  conflict 
with  the  sceptical  writers  of  our  own  time. 
That  Scripture  has  one  meaning,  and  one 
meaning  only,  is  their  fundamental  axiom  :  it 
is  seen  to  be,  and  felt  to  be,  one  of  the  keys 
of  their  position.  When,  however,  we  pause 
to  ask  how  that  one  meaning  is  to  be  defined, 
we  receive  answers  that  are  neither  very  intel- 
ligible nor  consistent.  If  we  are  told  that  it 
is  ' '  that  meaning  which  it  had  to  the  mind  of 
the  Prophet  or  Evangelist  who  first  uttered  or 
^Tote,  to  the  hearers  or  readers  who  first  re- 
ceived the  message,"  we  may  justly  protest 
against  an  answer  involving  alike  such  assump- 
tions and  such  ambiguities.  What  right  have 
we  to  assume  that  the  speaker  knew  the  full 
meaning  which  his  own  words  might  subse- 
quently be  found  to  bear  ?  A  very  little  refiec- 
tion  will  sliow  the  justice  of  this  query.  What 
right,  again,  have  we  to  assume  that  the 
meaning  which  the  Prophet  or  Evangelist  de- 
signed to  convey  was  identical  with  that  which 
the  hearers  or  readers  who  first  received  the 
message   conceived    to    be    conveyed    in    its 


120    SCBIPTVRE :  ITS  INTERPRETA  TION. 

words  ?  Assuming  even  that  it  was  so,  \iovf 
are  we  to  arrive  at  this  one  meaning  common 
to  hearer  and  speaker  ?  How  are  we  to  recog- 
nize it,  when  the  words  before  us  may  bear  two 
or  more  meanings,  each,  perliaps,  equally  prob- 
able and  supj)orted  by  arguments  of  equal  va- 
lidity ?  It  will  be  said  that  this  is  precisely  the 
duty  of  the  Interpreter  ;  that  it  is  for  him  to 
disengage  himself  from  the  trammels  of  the 
present,  and  free  from  the  bondage  of  pre- 
judices and  creeds  to  transport  himself  back 
into  the  past,  to  mingle  in  spirit  with  those 
who  first  heard  the  words,  to  feel  as  they  felt, 
to  hear  as  they  heard,  to  recover  the  one,  the 
true,  and  the  original  meaning,  and  to  bring  it 
back  to  the  hearer  or  reader  of  our  own  times. 
All  this  is  high-sounding  and  rhetorical  ;  it  is 
sure  to  attract  the  young  and  the  enthusiastic, 
and  by  no  means  ill-calculated  to  excite  and 
delude  the  inex23erienced.  But  it  is  rhetoric, 
and  nothing  more.  No  one  who  has  had  gen- 
uine experience  in  the  interpretation  of  Scrip- 
ture would  hesitate  to  pronounce  such  '^  mag- 
nifyings  of  an  office"  as  completely  delusive, 
if  even  not  deserving  the  graver  term,  mischiev- 
ous. Delusive  they  certainly  are,  because  all 
this  self -projection  into  the  past  is  in  reality, 
and  ever  has  been,  unostentatiously  practised 


SCniP  TURE :  ITS  INTERPRET  A  TION,     121 

by  all  better  interpreters — jby  all  who  have 
sought  with  humility  and  earnestness  to  catch 
the  spirit  and  inind  of  the  writer  whom  they 
are  striving  to  expound.  All  this  has  been 
practised,  almost  from  the  first.  Chrysostom 
spoke  of  it,  Augustine  commended  it,  and  yet 
what  has  been  the  result  of  experience  ?  Why, 
that  passage'  after  passage  has  been  found  to 
be  so  pregnant  with  meaning,  so  mysteriously 
full,  so  comprehensively  applicable,  that  the 
most   self-confident    interjD refer  in  the  world 

could  scarcelv  be  brought  to  declare  his  com- 

•J  ~ 

plete  conviction  that  the  one  view  out  of  many 
which  he  may  have  adopted  was  certainly  the 
principal  one,  much  less  that  it  was  the  only 
meaning  of  the  words  before  him. 

But  to  give  up  such  attitudes  of  delusive 
self-coniidence,  and  to  return  to  modesty  and 
reason,  we  may  now  proceed  to  illustrate  our 
first  assertion,  that  Scripture  has  fre(piently 
more  than  one  meaning,  by  references  to  three 
particulars  in  which  this  is  very  clearly  exem- 
plified,— double  meanings,  or  applications  of 
prophecy,  types,  and  deeper  senses  of  simple 
historical  statements.  A  few  remarks  shall 
be  made  on  each. 

(1.)  On  the  first  so  much  has  been  said  of  late 
that  it  might  almost  seem  pure  knight-errantry 


122     SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION, 

to  undertake  the  advocacy  of  what  (we  are  told) 
ought  now  to  be  regarded  as  a  mere  outworn 
prejudice.     And  yet  what  is  more  thoroughly 
consonant  with  reason,  and,  we  might  almost 
add,  experience,  than  such  a  belief  ?     We  say 
experience, — for  there  must  be  few  calm  ob- 
servers of  the  course  of  events  around  them 
who  can  fail  to  have  been    struck  with    the 
curious  re-appearance,  nnder  unlikely  circum- 
stances,   of    former    combinations,    and    who 
have  not  occasionally  been  almost  startled  by 
the  recurrence  of  incidents  in  relations  and 
<3onnexions  that  could  never  have  been  reason- 
ably expected    again.     It  does  not  seem  too 
much  to  say  that  in  many  instances  nations  and 
individuals  alike  seem  moving  as  it  were  in 
spirals,  constantly  returning,  not  exactly  to  the 
same  point,  but  to  the  same  bearings  and  the 
same  aspects, — not  precisely  to  a  former  past, 
but  to  a  present  that  bears  to  it  a  very  strange 
and  wholly  unlooked-for  resemblance.    If  this 
be  true  in  many  things  that  fall  under  our  own 
immediate  observation  (and  very  nnobservant 
must  he  be  who  has  not  often  verified  it  for 
himself),  if  we  often  se"em  to  ourselves  to  recog- 
nize this  principle  of  events  becoming  in  many 
respects  doubles  of  each  other,  and  that  not 
only  in  minor  matters,  but  even  in  circumstan- 


SCRIP  TUBE :  ITS  INTERPRKTA  TION.     123 

ces  of  some  historical  importance, — if  this  l)e 
so,  is  it  strange  that  in  the  spiritual  history 
of  our  race  there  should  be  such  parallelisms  ; 
that  words  apparently  spoken  in  reference  to  a 
precursory  series  of  events  should  be  found  to 
refer  with  equal  pertinence  to  some  myste- 
riously similar  combinations  that  appeared 
long  afterwards  ?  Are  we  to  think  that  coun- 
sels sealed  in  silence  from  eternity,  that  pur- 
poses of  the  ages  formed  before  the  worlds 
w^ere  made,  that  dispensations  of  love  and  mercy 
laid  out  even  before  the  objects  for  whom  they 
w^ere  designed  had  come  into  being,  w^ere  not 
over  and  over  again  reflected,  as  it  were, 
in  the  history  of  our  race,  and  that  the  events 
of  a  former  day  were  not  often  bound  in  mys- 
tical likenesses  and  affinities  with  the  events 
of  the  future  by  that  princi2)le  of  redeem- 
ing love  which  permeated  and  pervaded  all  ? 
Unless  we  are  prepared  plainly  to  adopt  some 
of  the  bleakest  theories  of  the  scej^ticism  of 
these  later  days  ;  unless  we  are  determined  to 
find  civilization  and  development  and  not  God 
in  history  ;  unless  we  have  resolved  to  see  in 
the  Gospel  no  foreordered  dispensation,  but 
only  a  system  of  morality,  una,nnounced,  un- 
foreshadowed,  as  strange  in  its  isolated  and 
exceptional  character  as  it  has    been  strange 


124     SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

in  its  effects, — then,  and  then  only,  can  we 
consistently  deny  the  likelihood  and  probabil- 
ity of  God's  purposes  to  the  world  having  im- 
parted to  events  seemingly  remote  and  nncon  - 
nected,  and  to  issues  brought  about  by  varied 
and  dissimilar  circumstances,  real  and  spiritual 
resemblances.  Then  only  can  we  JTistly  deny 
that  the  word  of  prophecy  might  truly,  legiti- 
mately, and  consistently  be  considered  to  refer 
as  well  to  earlier  as  to  later  events,  wherever 
such  resemblances  could  be  reasonably  demon- 
strated to  exist. 

To  illustrate  the  foregoing  comments  by  an 
example,  let  us  take  an  instance  which  our  op- 
ponents are  never  wearied  with  bringing  for- 
ward,— our  Lord's  prophecy  relative    to   the 
fate  of  Jerusalem  and  the  end  of  the  world. 
Here  it  is  said  that  the  system  of  first  and  sec- 
ond meanings,  which  we  are  now  defending, 
is  most  palpably  nothing  whatever  else  than 
an  attempt  to  lielp  out    the  verification  and 
mitigate  the  incoherence  of  a  somewhat  con- 
fused and  partially  unrealized  prophecy.    Now, 
in  disposing  of  this  idle  but  painfully  familiar 
comment,   we  will   make   no   alhision  to  the 
question  of  the  four  Apostles,  which,  it  may 
be  observed,  necessitated  in  the  answer  refer- 
ence to  the  end  of  the  world  as  well  as  to  the 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.     125 

end  of  the  Theocracy  (Matt.  xxiv.  3)  ;  we  will 
only  take  the  prophecy  as  we  tind  it,  with  its 
mingled  alhisions  to  a  near  and  to  a  remote 
future,  and  simply  incpiire  whether  there  is 
any  such  resemblance,  spiritual  or  otherwise, 
as  might  make  expressions  used  in  reference 
to  the  one  almost  interchangeably  applicable 
to  the  other.  Who  can  doubt  what  the  an- 
swer must  be  ?  Who  that  takes  into  considera- 
tion the  true  significance  of  the  fall  of  Jeru- 
salem, who  that  Sees  in  it,  as  every  sober  reader 
must  see,  not  merely  the  fall  of  an  ancient  city, 
but  the  destruction  of  the  visible  seat  of  Je- 
hovah's worship,  the  enforced  cessation  of  the 
ancient  order  of  things,  the  practical  abroga- 
tion of  the  Theocracy, — all  closely  synchro- 
nous with  the  Lord's  first  coming, — who  is 
there  that  will  take  all  these  things  fairly  into 
consideration  and  not  be  ready  to  acknowledge 
resemblances  between  the  end  of  the  fated 
city  and  the  issues  of  the  present  disj^ensa- 
tion,  sufticiently  mysterious  and  sufficiently 
profound  to  warrant  our  even  alternating  be- 
tween them  (we  use  the  studiedly  exaggerated 
language  of  opponents)  the  verses  of  the  Lord's 
great  prophecy  ?  Till  it  can  be  shown  that 
the  course  of  things  is  fortuitous,  that  pro- 
vidential dispensations  are  a  dream,  and  the 


126     SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION, 

gradual  development  of  the  counsels  of  God  a 
convenient  fiction — till  it  can  be  made  clear 
to  demonstration,  that  there  are  no  profound 
harmonies  in  the  Divine  government,  no  mys- 
tical recurrences  of  foreordered  combinations, 
no  spiritual  affinities  between  the  past  and  the 
present,  no  foreseen  resemblances  in  epochal 
events,  and-  no  predestined  counterparts,  the 
ground  on  which  the  reasonable  belief  in 
double  meanings  and  double  applications  of 
prophecy  has  been  rightly  judged  to  rest  will 
remain  stable  and  nnshaken  ;  the  perspective 
character  that  has  been  attributed  to  Scriptural 
predictions  will  still  claim  to  be  considered  no 
idle  or  unreal  imagination. 

(2)  The  subject  of  tyijes  has  been  much 
dwelt  uj)on  by  modern  writers,  and  in  most 
cases  with  unsingular  fairness.  The  popular 
mode  of  arguing  on  this  subject  is  to  select 
some  instances  from  early  Christian  waiters 
which  are  obviously  fanciful  and  untenable,  to 
hold  up  the  skirts  of  their  folly,  to  display 
their  utter  nakedness,  and  then  to  ask  if  a  sys- 
tem of  which  these  are  examj^les  either  can 
or  ought  to  be  regarded  with  any  degree  of 
favor  or  confidence.  If  Justin  tells  us  that 
the  king  of  Assyria  signified  Herod,  and  Je- 
rome was  of    opinion  that  by  Chaldeeans  are 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRET  A  TION.     127 

meant  Daemons,  if  the  scarlet  thread  of  Rahab 
has  been  deemed  to  liave  a  liidden  meanings 
and  the  number  of  Abraham's  followers  has 
been  regarded  as  not  wholly  T\nthout  signifi- 
cance, we  are  asked  whether  we  can  deem  the 
whole  system  otherwise  than  precarious  and 
extravagant,  whether  we  can  at  all  safely  at- 
tribute to  the  details  of  the  Mosaic  ritual  a 
reference  to  the  J^ew  Testament,  or  really  be- 
lieve that  the  passage  of  the  Red  Sea  can  be 
very  certainly  considered  a  type  .of  baptism. 
The  ultimate  design  of  this  mode  of  arguing 
will  not  escape  the  intelligent  reader  ; — it  is 
simply  an  endeavor  l)y  slow  sap  to  weaken 
the  authority  of  some  of  the  writers  of  the 
New  Testament,  and  to  leave  it  to  be  inferred 
that  our  Lord  Himself,  in  recognizing  and 
even  giving  sanction  to  such  applications  of 
Scripture  (Matt.  xii.  40,  John  iii.  14  ;  comp. 
ch.  \i.  58),  either  condescended  to  adojDt  forms 
of  illustration  which  he  must  have  felt  to  be 
untrustworthy,  or  else  really  in  this  did  not 
rise  wholly  above  the  culture  of  His  own 
times.  ]S'ow  at  i3resent,  without  at  all  desiring 
to  press  wdiat  we  have  not  yet  discussed — the 
inspiration  of  Scripture — we  do  very  earnestly 
call  upon  those  who  are  not  yet  preimred 
wholly  to  fling  off  their  allegiance  to  Scripture, 


128     SCRIPTURE :  ITS  INTERPRET  A  TION, 

to  bear  in  mind  the  following  facts  : — {a)  Tliat 
our  Blessed  Lord  Himself  referred  to  the 
Brazen  Serpent  as  typical  of  his  being  raised 
aloft,  and  that  He  illustrated  the  mystery  of 
His  own  abode  in  the  chambers  of  the  earth 
by  an  event  of  the  past  which  He  Himself 
was  pleased  to  denominate  as  a  sign, — the  only 
:sign  that  was  to  be  vouchsafed  to  the  genera- 
tion that  then  w^as  seeking  for  one  ;  (Z>)  that 
the  Ev^angelists  recognize  the  existence  and 
significance  of  types  in  reference  to  our  Lord 
(Matt.  ii.  15  ;  John  xix.  36)  ;  {c)  that  the  teach- 
ing of  St.  Paul  is  pervaded  by  references  to  this 
form  of  what  has  been  termed  "^  acted  prophe- 
cies" (E-oni.  V.  l^seq.'^  1  Cor.  v.  Y,  x.  2  seq.\ 
Oal.  i  V.  24  seq. ;  Col.  ii.  11) ;  (6^),that  the  greater 
part  of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  is  one  con- 
tinued elucidation  of  the  spiritual  significance  of 
the  principal  features  of  the  Levitical  law  :  its 
sacrifices,  rites,  and  priests  were  all  the  shadows 
and  typical  resemblances  of  good  things  to 
come  (Heb.  x.  1)  ;  (e)  that  St.  Peter  plainly 
and  distinctly  declares  that  the  water  of  the 
Flood  is  typical  of  baptism  (1  Pet.  iii.  21)  ; 
{/)  that  in  the  last  and  most  mysterious  revela- 
tion of  God  to  man  the  very  realms  of  blessed- 
ness and  glory  are  designated  by  a  name  and 
specified   by  allusions    (Rev.   xxi.   22)    which 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRFAW  TION.     129 

warrant  our  recognizing  in  tlie  Holy  City  on 
earth,  the  '^  Jerusalem  that  now  is,"  a  type  of 
that  Heavenly  City  which  God  hath  prepared 
for  the  faithful  (Ileb.  xi.  16),  a  similitude  of 
tlie  Jerusalem  that  is  above,  a  shadow  of  the 
incorruptible  inheritance  of  the  servants  and 
children  of  God. 

When  we  dw^ell  calmly  U2)on  these  things, 
when  we  observe  further  how,  not  only  thus 
directly  and  explicitly,  but  how,  also,  indirectly 
and  by  allusion,  nearly  every  writer  in  the  New 
Testament  bears  Avitness  to  the  existence  and 
significance  of  tj^es,  how  it  tinges  their  lan- 
guage of  consolation  (Rev.  xxi.  2  seq.)^  and  gives 
force  to  their  exhortations  (Heb.  iv.  14) ;  when 
we  finally  note  how  the  very  Eternal  Spirit  of 
God,  by  whom  they  were  inspired,  is  specially 
declared  to  have  vouchsafed  thus  to  involve  in 
the  ceremonies  of  the  past  the  deejD  truths  of  the 
future  (Heb.  ix.  8),  when  Ave  calmly  consider 
the  cumulative  force  of  all  these  examples  and 
all  these  testimonies,  we  may  perhaps  be  in- 
duced to  pause  before  we  adopt  the  sweeping 
statements  that  have  been  made  in  reference 
to  the  whole  system  of  typology.  We  may 
admit  that  types  may  have  been  often  injudi- 
ciously applied,  that  it  may  be  difliicult  to  fix 
bounds  to  their  use  or  to  specify  the  measure 
9 


1 30     SCRIPTURE  :  ITS  INTERPRETATION, 

of  their  aptitude,  and  jet  we  may  indeed  seri- 
ously ask  for  time  to  consider  whether  such  re- 
cognitions of  the  deeper  meanings  of  Scripture 
thus  vouchsafed  to  us,  and  thus  sanctioned  by 
our  Lord  and  His  Apostles,  are  to  be  given 
up  at  once  because  they  are  thought  to  come 
in  collision  with  modern  views  of  Scripture 
and  modern  canons  of  interpretation.  Our  op- 
ponents may  well  be  anxious  to  get  rid  of  the 
whole  system  of  tyjDes  ;  we  can  understand 
their  anxiety,  we  can  even  find  reasons  for  the 
sort  of  desperation  that  scruples  not  to  repre- 
sent what  was  once  sanctioned  by  our  Lord  and 
His  Apostles  as  now  either  mischievous  or  in- 
applicable. It  is  felt  that  if  typology  is  ad- 
mitted, the  assertion  that  Scripture  has  but 
one  meaning  is  invalidated.  It  is  seen  clearly 
enough  that  if  it  can  be  shown,  within  any 
reasonable  degree  of  probability,  that  the  de- 
tails of  a  past  dispensation  were  regarded  by 
the  first  teachers  of  Christianity  as  veritable 
types  and  symbols  of  things  that  have  now 
come,  then  the  recognition  of  further  and 
deeper  meanings  in  Scripture,  of  secondary 
senses  and  ultimate  significations,  must  direct- 
ly and  inevitably  follow,  and  the  rule  that  the 
Bible  is  to  be  interpreted  like  any  other  book 
at  once  be  shown  to  be,  what  it  certainly  is, 


SCRIPTURE :  ITS  INTERPRETA  TION.     131 

inapplical)le.  Need  we  wonder  then  that  every 
effort  has  been  made  to  denounce  a  system  so 
obstructive  to  modern  innovations  ;  need  we 
be  surprised  that  the  rejection  of  what  is  thus 
accredited  has  been  as  persistent  as  it  would 
now  seem  proved  to  be  both  unreasonable  and 
without  success  ? 

(3.)  Our  third  subject  for  consideration,  the 
existence  of  deeper  meanings  in  Scripture, 
even  in  what  might  seem  simple  historical 
statements,  follows  very  naturally  after  what 
has  just  been  discussed.  Here  again  we  can 
adopt  no  more  convincing  mode  of  demon- 
stration than  is  supplied  l)y  an  appeal  to  Scrip- 
ture. Yet  we  may  not  unj^rohtably  make  one 
or  two  preliminary  comments.  In  the  Urst 
place,  is  not  this  assertion  of  a  oneness  of  mean- 
ing in  the  written  words  of  an  intelligent  au- 
thor open  to  some  discussion  ?  Is  it  at  all 
clear,  even  in  the  case  of  uninspired  writers, 
that  the  primary  and  literal  meaning  is  the 
only  meaning  which  is  to  be  recognized  in 
their  words  ?  Is  it  so  wholly  inconceivable  that 
more  meanings  than  one  may  have  been  ac- 
tually designed  at  the  time  of  writing,  and 
that,  conjointly  witli  a  leading  and  primary 
meaning,  a  secondary  and  subordinate  mean- 
ing may  have  been  felt,  recognized,  and  intend- 


132     SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

ed  ?  Nay,  can  we  be  perfectly  certain  that  even 
words  may  not  have  been  specially  or  instinc- 
tively chose  which  should  leave  this  second- 
ary meaning  fairly  distinct  and  fairly  recog- 
nizable ?  It  would  not  be  difficult  to  substan- 
tiate the  justice  of  these  queries  by  actual  ex- 
amples from  the  writings  of  any  of  the  greater 
authors  whether  of  our  own  or  some  other 
country.  Still  less  difficult  would  it  be  to 
show  that  in  very  many  passages  meanings 
must  certainly  be  admitted  which  it  may  be 
probable  were  not  intended  by  the  writer,  but 
which  nevertheless  by  their  force  and  perti- 
nence make  it  frequently  doubtful  whether 
what  has  been  assumed  to  be  the  primary 
meaning  of  the  words  is  really  to  be  deemed 
so,  and  whether  what  is  judged  to  be  an  applica- 
tion may  not  really  represent  the  truest  aspects 
of  the  mind  and  intentions  of  the  author. 

Let  us  add  this  second  remark,  that  the  in- 
stances in  which  words  have  been  found 
to  involve  m^eanings,  not  recognized  at  the 
time  by  reader  or  by  writer,  but  which  after- 
circumstances  have  shown  were  really  to  be 
regarded  as  meanings,  are  by  no  means  few  or 
exceptional.  The  whole  group  of  illustrations 
supplied  by  "  ominata  verba,"  the  whole  class 
of  cases  which  belong  to  that  sort  of  uncon- 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.     133 

scious   prescience   wliicli    is   often   found    in 
minds  of  liiglier  strain,  the  various  instances 
Avhere  glimpses  of  yet  undiscovered  relations 
have  given  a  tinge,  to  expressions  which  will 
■only  be  fully  understood  and  realized  when 
those  relations  are  themselves  fully  known, — 
all  these  things,  and  many  more  than  these, 
might  be  adduced  as  illustrative  of  the  deeper 
meanings  that  are  often  found  to  lie  in  the 
words  of  mere  uninspired  men.     Such  mean- 
ings neither  they  nor  their  own  contemporaries 
may  have  distinctly  recognized,  but  meanings 
they  are  notwithstanding  ;  not  merely  applica- 
tions or  extensions,  but  meanings  in  the  sim- 
ple and  regular  acceptation  of  the  tenn.    How 
this  is  to  be  accounted  for,  we  are  not  called 
upon  to  show.    We  will  not  speculate  how  far 
the  great  and  the  good  of  every  age  and  nation 
may  have  been  moved  by  the  inworking  Sj^irit 
of  God  to  declare  truths  of  wider  application 
than  they  themselves  may  have  felt  or  real- 
ized ;  we  will  not  seek  to  estimate  the  vary- 
ing degrees  of  that  power  of  partially  foresee- 
ing future  relations  which  long  and    patient 
study  of  the  past  and  the  present  has  some- 
times been  found  to  impart.     All  sucli  things 
are  probably  Ijeyond  our  grasp,  and  would  most 
likely  be  found  to  elude  our  present  powei*s 


184    SCRIP  TUBE :  ITS  INTERPRETA  TION. 

and  present  means  of  appreciation.  With  rea- 
sons we  will  not  embarrass  ourselves  ;  we  will 
be  satisfied  with  simply  calling  attention  to 
the  fact  that  the  existence  of  such  phenom- 
ena as  that  of  words  having  deeper  and  fuller 
meanings  than  they  were  understood  to  have  at 
first  is  not  only  not  to  be  denied,  but  may  even 
be  deemed  matter  of  something  more  than  oc- 
casional experience. 

The  two  foregoing  observations  will, perhaps^ 
have  in  some  measure  prepared  us  for  forming 
a  more  just  estimate  of  the  further  and  sec- 
ond meanings  that  have  been  attributed  to  the 
words  of  Scripture.  If  it  be  admitted  that  some 
of  the  phenomena  to  which  we  have  alluded  are 
occasionally  to  be  recognized  in  purely  human 
writings,  is  it  altogether  strange  that  in  a  reve- 
lation from  God  the  same  should  exist  in  fuller 
measures,  and  under  still  clearer  aspects  ?  If 
the  many-sidedness,  mobility,  and  varied  pow- 
ers of  combination  existing  in  the  human  mind, 
appear  at  times  to  invest  words  written  or  sj)o- 
ken  with  a  significance  of  a  fuller  and  deeper 
kind  than  may  at  first  be  recognized,  are  we  to 
be  surprised  if  something  similar  in  kind,  but 
higher  in  degree,  is  to  be  observed  in  the  lan- 
guage of  Holy  Scripture  ?  Is  the  Divine  mind 
not  to  have  influences  which  are  conceded  to 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.     18;") 

the  Imman  ?  Are  the  words  of  Prophets  or 
Evangehsts  to  be  less  pregnant  in  meaning,  or 
more  circuinseribed  in  their  applications,  than 
those  of  poets  and  philosophers  ?  Witliout  as- 
suming one  attribute  in  the  Scripture  beyond 
what  all  our  more  reasonable  opponents  would 
be  ^\dlling  to  concede,  without  claiming  more 
for  it  than  to  be  considered  a  revelaion  from 
God,  a  communication  from  the  Divine  mind 
to  the  minds  and  hearts  of  men,  we  may  justly 
claim  some  hearing  for  this  form  of  the  a  pri- 
ori argument  ;  W(5  may  with  reason  ask  all  fair 
disputants  whether  they  are  j)repared  positively 
to  deny,  in  the  case  of  a  communication  di- 
rectly or  even  indirectly  from  God,  the  proba- 
bility of  our  findhig  there  some  enhancement 
of  the  higher  characteristics  and  more  remark- 
able phenomena  that  have  been  recognized  in 
communications  of  man  to  men  i 

When  we  leave  these  d  priori  considera- 
tions, and  turn  to  definite  examples  and  illus- 
trations, our  anticipations  cannot  be  said  to 
have  disappointed  us.  AVe  have  really  an 
afftuence  of  examples  of  second  and  deeper 
meanings  being  deliberately  assigned  to  pas- 
sages of  Scripture  that  might  have  l)een  other- 
wise deemed  to  have  only  the  one  simple  or 
historical  meaning  that  seems  first  to  present 


136     SCRIP  TUBE :  ITS  INTERPRETA  TION. 

Itself.  Let  us  select  two  or  three  instances.  Is 
it  possible  to  deny  that  our  Lord  Himself  dis- 
closes, in  what  might  have  been  deemed  a 
mere  title  of  Jehovah  under  His  aspects  of 
relation  to  favored  worshippers,  a  meaning  so 
full  and  so  deep  that  it  formed  the  basis  of 
an  argument  (Matt.  xxii.  31  seq.  ;  Mark  xii. 
24  seq.  ;  Luke  xx.  37  seq.)  ?  The  familiar 
titular  designation  is  shown  to  be  the  vehicle 
of  a  spiritual  truth  of  the  widest  application  ; 
the  apparently  mere  recapitulation  of  the 
names  of  a  son,  a  father,  and  a  grandfather, 
in  connexion  with  the  God  whose  servants 
they  were,  and  whom  they  worshipped,  is  not 
only  urged  as  proving  a  fundamental  doctrine, 
but  is  tacitly  acknowledged  to  have  done  so 
by  gainsayers  and  opponents  (Luke  xx.  39). 
And  further,  let  it  be  observed,  that  it  is 
clearly  implied  that  this  was  no  deeply-hidden 
meaning,  no  profound  interpretation,  which  it 
might  require  a  special  revelation  to  disclose, 
but  that  it  was  a  meaning  which  really  ought 
to  have  been  recognized  by  a  deeper  reader, — 
at  any  rate  that  not  to  have  done  so  argued 
as  plain  an  ignorance  of  the  Written  Word  as 
it  did  of  the  power  and  operations  of  God 
(Matt.  xxii.  29).  Let  this  really  "preroga- 
tive" example  be  fairly  considered  and  prop- 


SCniPTURE:  ITS  INTEUPllETATION.    187 

erly  estimated,  and  then  let  it  be  asked  if  the 
existence  of  deeper  meanings  in  Scripture  can 
consistently  be  denied  by  any  who  profess  a 
belief  in  onr  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  It  seems  to 
us  that  this  is  a  plain  case  of  a  dilemma  : 
eitlier  with  Strauss  and.Hase  we  must  regard 
the  argument  as  an  example  of  Rabbinical 
sopliistry, — and  so,  as  Meyer  reminds  us,  be 
prepared  to  sacrifice  the  character  and  dignity 
of  our  Lord, — or  we  must  admit  that,  in  some 
cases  at  least,  there  is  more  in  Scripture  than 
the  mere  literal  sense  of  the  words. 

Such  an  example  opens  the  way  for  the  in- 
troduction of  others,  which  without  this  j^re- 
rogative  instance,  could  not  have  been  strongly 
urged,  except  on  assumptions  which,  in  our 
present  position  in  the  argument,  it  would  not 
be  logically  consistent  to  make.  By  being  as- 
sociated, however,  Avith  the  present  example, 
they  certainly  seem  to  be  of  some  force  and 
validity  in  confirming  our  present  assertion, 
and,  to  say  the  very  least,  can  be  more  easily 
explained  on  that  hyi^othesis  than  on  any 
other  that  has  yet  been  assigned.  Let  us 
specify  Matt.  ii.  15.  Now  tlie  (piestion  pre- 
sents itself  in  the  following  form  : — Is  not  this 
an  example  furnished  by  the  Apostle  of  what 
we  have  already  seen  must  be  recognized  in 


138    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION, 

an  example  s^ouclisafed  by  his  Lord  ?  Is  not 
this  a  case  of  deeper  meaning  ?  Do  not  the 
words  of  Hosea,  the  second  meaning  of  which 
was  doubtless  not  more  aj)23arent  even  to  the 
prophet  himself  than  it  was  to  his  earlier 
readers,  seem  only  to  have  a  simple  historical 
reference  to  the  earthly  Israel  ?  and  yet  do 
they  not  really  involve  a  further  and  typical 
reference  to  Him  who  was  truly  and  essentially 
what  Israel  was  graciously  denominated  (Exod. 
iv.  22  ;  comp.  Jerem.  xxxi.  9),  and  of  whom 
Israel  was  a  type  and  a  shadow  ?  So,  at  any 
rate,  St.  Matthew  plainly  asserts.  Which,  then, 
of  these  hypotheses  do  we  think  most  proba- 
ble,— that  St.  Matthew  erroneously  ascribed  a 
meaning  to  words  which  they  do  not  and  were 
not  intended  to  bear,  that  the  two  chapters  are 
an  interpolation  (for  such  an  hypothesis  has 
been  advanced),  or  that  they  supply  an  in- 
stance of  a  second  and  typical  meaning  in 
words  of  a  sim23ly  historical  aspect,  and  that  a 
truth  is  here  disclosed  by  an  Apostle  similar 
to  what  we  have  already  seen  has  been  clearly 
disclosed  by  our  Lord  ? 

Let  us  take  yet  another,  and  that,  as  it 
might  be  thought,  a  very  hojDeless  instance. 
St.  Paul,  in  his  Epistle  to  the  Ephesians  (ch. 
iv.  8),  not  only  makes  a  citation  from  a  Psalm, 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    139 

wliicli  at  the  part  in  question  appears  to  have 
a  simple  historical  reference  to  some  event  of 
the  time  (perhaps  the  taking  of  Rabbah),  but 
even  alters  the  words  of  the  original  so  as  to 
make  its  application  to  our  Lord  more  pertinent 
and  telling.  What  are  we  to  say  of  such  a 
case  ?  Does  it  not  really  look  like  an  instance 
of  almost  unwarrantable  accommodation  ? 
Does  it  not  seem  as  if  we  had  now  fairly  fallen 
upon  the  point  of  our  own  sword,  and  that,  in 
citing  an  example  of  a  second  meaning,  we 
had  unwittingly  selected  one  in  w^iich  the  very 
alteration  shows  that  the  words  did  not  orig- 
inally have  the  meaning  now  attributed  to 
them  ?  Before  we  thus  yield,  let  us  at  any 
rate  state  the  case,  and  leave  the  fair  reader  to 
form  his  own  opinion.  Without  at  present  as- 
suming the  existence  of  any  influence  which 
would  have  directly  prevented  the  Apostle 
from  so  seriously  misunderstanding  and  so 
gravely  misapplying  a  passage  of  the  Old  Tes- 
tament, and  only  assuming  it  as  proved  that 
there  is  one  authentic  instance  of  words  of 
Scripture  bearing  a  further  meaning  than 
meets  the  eye,  we  now  ask  which  is  to  be 
judged  as  most  likely  :  that  the  Apostle  to 
substantiate  a  statement,  which  could  have 
been  easily  substantiated  by  other  passages,  de- 


140     SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

liber ately  altered  a  portion  of  Scrij^ture  wliicli 
had  no  reference  to  the  matter  before  him,  or 
that  he  rightly  assigned  to  a  seemingly  his- 
torical 23assage  from  a  Psalm,  which  (be  it 
observed),  in  its  original  scope,  has  every  ap- 
pearance of  being  prophetic  and  Messianic,  a 
deeper  meaning  than  the  words  seem  to  bear 
(such  a  meaning  being  in  one  case,  at  least,  ad- 
mitted to  exist),  and  that  he  altered  the  form 
of  the  words  to  make  more  palpable  and  evi- 
dent the  meaning  which  he  knew  they  in- 
volved ?  We  have  no  anxiety  as  to  the  deci- 
sion in  the  case  of  any  calm-jndging  and  un- 
biassed reader One  further  remark 

we  may  make  in  conclusion,  and  it  is  a  remark 
of  some  little  importance,  viz.,  that  if  the 
present  instance  be  deemed  an  example  of 
Scripture  having  a  second  and  deeper,  as 
well  as  a  first  and  more  simple  meaning,  it 
must  also  be  regarded  as  an  example  of  an  au- 
thoritative change  in  the  exact  words  of  a  quo- 
tation,— ^the  change  being  designed  to  bring 
up  the  underlying  meaning  which  was  known 
to  exist,  and  to  place  it  with  more  distinctness 
before  the  mind  of  the  general  reader. 

III.  Having  thus,  as  it  would  seem,  sub- 
stantiated our  assertion  that  deeper  meanings 
lie  in  Scripture  than  appear  on  the  surface,  and 


SCR  IPTURE :  ITS  INTERPRKTA  TION.    141 

that  this  may  be  properly  considered  as  in  part 
accounting  for  the  existence  of  some  of  those 
difficulties  and  diversities  which  are  met  with 
in  Scripture  interpretation,  we  now  pass  to  the 
third  assertion  relative  to  the  subject,  viz., 
that  Scripture  is  divinely  inspired. 

Here  we  enter  upon  a  wide  subject,  which 
may  with  reason  claim  for  itself  a  separate 
and  independent  essay,  and  which  certainly 
ought  fully  to  be  disposed  of  before  any  rules 
bearing  upon  interpretation  can  properly  be 
laid  down.  As  a  longer  discussion  of  this  sub- 
ject will  be  found  in  another  portion  of  our 
volume,  we  will  here  only  make  a  very  few 
general  remarks  upon  inspiration  as  imme- 
diately bearing  upon  interpretation,  and  more 
especially  upon  the  estimate  formed  of  its  na- 
ture and  extent  by  the  advocates  of  the  system 
of  Scriptural  exegesis  now  under  our  consid- 
eration. 

In  the  outset,  let  it  be  said  that  we  heartily 
concur  with  the  majority  of  our  opponents  in 
rejecting  all  theories  of  inspiration,  and  in 
sweeping  aside  all  those  distinctions  and  defi- 
nitions which,  only  in  too  many  cases,  have 
been  merely  called  forth  by  emergencies,  and 
drawn  up  for  no  other  purpose  than  to  meet 
real   and   supposed   difficulties.     The  remark 


142    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPREIATION.^ 

probably  is  just,  that  most  of  the  current  ex- 
planations err  more  especially  in  attempting 
to  define  what,  though  real,  is  incaj)able  of 
being  defined  in  an  exact  manner.  Hence  all 
such  iterms  as  ' '  mechanical ' '  and  ' '  dynami- 
cal ' '  inspiration,  and  all  the  theories  that  have 
grown  round  these  epithets, — all  such  distinc- 
tions as  inspirations  of  superintendence,  in- 
spirations of  suggestion,  and  so  forth, — all 
attempts  again  to  draw  lines  of  demarcation 
between  the  inspiration  of  the  books  of 
Scripture  themselves  and  the  inspiration  of  the 
authors  of  which  those  books  were  results, 
may  be  most  profitably  dismissed  from  our 
thoughts,  and  the  whole  subject  calmly  recon- 
sidered from  what  may  be  termed  a  Scriptural 
point  of  view.  The  holy  Volume  itself  shall 
exj)lain  to  us  the  nature  of  that  influence  by 
which  it  is  pervaded  and  quickened. 

8.  Thus  far  we  are  ^^erfectly  in  accord  with 
our  opponents.  We  are  agreed  on  both  sides 
that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  inspiration  in  refer- 
ence to  the  Scriptures,  and  we  are  further 
agreed  that  the  Scriptures  themselves  are  the 
best  sources  of  information  on  the  subject. 
Here,  however,  all  agreement  com]3letely 
ceases.  When  we  invite  our  opponents  to  go 
with  us  to  the  Scriptures  to  discuss  their  state- 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    1-13 

ments  on  the  subject  before  us,  and  to  com- 
pare the  inferences  and  deductions  that  eitlier 
side  may  make  from  them,  we  at  once  find  that 
by  an  appeal  to  Scripture  we  and  our  oppo- 
nents mean  sometliing  utterly  and  entirely 
different.  We  mean  a  consideration  of  what 
Scripture  says  about  itself  :  we  find  that  they 
mean  a  stock-taking  of  its  errors  and  inaccura- 
cies, of  its  antagonisms  with  science  and  its 
oppositions  to  history, — all  which  they  tell  us 
must  first  be  estimated,  and  with  all  which  they 
urge,  that  inspiration,  be  it  whatever  it  may, 
must  be  reconcilable  and  harmonized.  In  a 
word,  both  sides  have  started  from  the  first 
on  widely  different  assumptions.  We  assume 
that  what  Scripture  says  is  trustworthy,  and 
80  conceive  that  it  may  be  fittingly  appealed 
to  as  a  witness  concerning  its  own  characteris- 
tics ;  t/tey  assume  that  it  abounds  in  errors  and 
incongruities,  and  suggest  that  the  number  and 
nature  of  these  ought  to  be  generally  ascer- 
tained before  any  further  step  can  be  taken,  or 
any  opinion  safely  arrived  at  on  the  whole  sub- 
ject. Such  seems  a  fair  estimate  of  the  posi- 
tion and  attitude  of  tlie  two  contending  par- 
ties. 

If  this  statement  of  our  relative  positions  l)e 
just,  it  seems  perfectly  clear  that  several  differ- 


144    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

ent  lines  of  argument  may  be  adopted.  We 
may  examine  the  grounds  on  which  their  as- 
sumption rests,  or  endeavor  to  estabhsh  the 
validity  of  our  own.  We  may  deny  that  any 
errors  or  inaccuracies  exist,  and  throw  upon 
them  the  07ms  jjrohandi^  or  we  may  take  the 
most  popular  and  telling  instances  in  their 
enumeration  and  endeavor  to  discover  by  fair 
investigation  how  far  they  deserve  their  posi- 
tion, and  how  far  prejudice  and  exaggeration 
may  not  have  been  at  work  on  their  side,  as 
conservatism  and  accommodation  on  ours.  All 
these  are  courses  which  may  be  adopted  with 
more  or  less  advantage,  but  any  one  of  which 
would  occupy  far  more  space  than  we  can 
afford  for  this  portion  of  our  subject.  We 
must  satisfy  ourselves,  on  the  present  occasion, 
with  making,  on  the  one  hand,  a  few  affirma- 
tive comments  upon  the  nature,  degree,  and 
limits  of  the  inspiration  which  we  assign  to 
the  Scripture  ;  and  on  the  other  hand,  a  few 
negative  comments  upon  counter- statements 
advanced  by  opponents,  which  seem  more  than 
usually  untrustworthy. 

To  begin  with  the  negative  side,  let  us  ob- 
serve, in  the  first  place,  that  nothing  can  really 
be  less  tenable  than  the  assertion  that  there  is 
no  foundation  in  the  Gospels  or  Epistles  for 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATIOy.     145 

any  of  the  higlier  or  supernatural  views  of  in- 
spiration. It  is  a  perfectly  intelligible  line  of 
argument  to  assert  that  for  the  testimony  of 
any  book  upon  its  own  nature  and  characteris- 
tics to  be  worth  anything,  it  must  iirst  be 
shown  that  the  book  can  fully  be  relied  on  : 
it  is  quite  consistent  with  fair  reasoning  to  re- 
fuse to  accept  as  final  or  conclusive  the  evidence 
of  what  it  may  be  contended  has  been  shown 
to  be  a  damaged  witness.  Such  modes  of 
argument  are  quite  fair  and  intelligible,  and 
as  such  we  have  no  fault  to  find  with  them  ; 
but  to  make  at]  the  outset  an  assertion,  such  as 
we  are  now  considering, — to  prejudice  the 
minds  of  the  inexj^erienced  by  an  afiirmation, 
which,  if  believed,  cannot  fail  to  produce  the 
strongest  possible  effect,  and  which  all  the 
time  is  the  very  reverse  of  what  is  the  fact,  is 
indeed  very  like  that  '^  random  scattering  of  r- 
uneasiness"  which  has  been  attributed  to  our 
opponents,*  and  which  such  cases  as  the  pres- 
ent go  ver}^  far  to  substantiate.  It  is  scarcely 
possible  that  those  who  make  such  assertions 
can  be  ignorant  of  the  terms  in  which  our  Lord 
is  represented  by  the  Gospels  to  have  spoken 
about  the  Scriptures  of  the  Old  Testament. 

*  See  Moberiy,  Preface  to   '  Sermons  on  the  Beati- 
tudes,' p.  ii.  J 
10 


r 


146    SCRIPTURE:    ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

It  cannot  surely  be  forgotten  that  He  said  that 
they  "  conld  not  be  broken"  (John  x.  35),  and 
that  when  He  so  spake  He  was  using  Scripture 
in  a  manner  that  ahnost  vouched  for  its  verbal 
and  literal  infallibility.  It  cannot  have  been 
overlooked  that  when  He  was  citing  the  words 
of  David  He  defined  the  divine  influence  under 
which  those  words  were  uttered  (Mark  xii.  36). 
Does  not  an  Evangelist  record  His  promise  to 
His  Apostles  that  the  Holy  Ghost  ''  should 
teach  them  all  things,  and  bring  all  things 
w^hicli  He  said  to  them  to  their  remembrance" 
(John  xiv.  26)  ?  and  does  not  that  same  Evan- 
gelist mention  the  yet  more  inclusive  promise 
that  the  same  Eternal  Spirit  should  lead  the 
Disciples  into  '^the  whole  truth"  (John  xvi. 
13)  ?  and  are  such  words  to  be  explained  away 
or  to  be  limited  ?  Does  not  the  same  writer 
further  tell  us  that  the  Holy  Ghost  was  almost 
visibly  given  to  the  Apostles  by  the  Lord  Him- 
self (John  XX.  22)  ?  and  does  not  another 
Evangelist  tell  of  the  completed  fulness  of  that 
gift,  and  of  men  so  visibly  filled  wdth  the 
Holy  Spirit  that  the  lips  of  bystanders  and 
strangers  bore  their  ready  and  amazed  testi- 
mony ?  Have  we  no  foundation  for  asserting 
a  higher  inspiration  when  eleven  men  are  told 
by  a  parting  Lord  that  they  are  to  be  His  wit- 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    147 

nesses,  and  tliat  they  are  to  receiv^e  supernatu- 
ral assistance  for  tlieir  mission  ?  Is  testimony 
to  be  contined  to  words  spoken,  and  to  be  de- 
nied to  words  written  ?  Did  the  power  that 
glowed  in  the  heart  of  the  speaker  die  out 
when  he  took  up  the  pen  of  the  writer  ?  Was 
not,  again,  the  "'  demonstration  of  the  Spirit" 
laid  claim  to  by  St.  Paul  (1  Cor.  ii,  4)  ;  was  it 
not  ''  God's  wisdom"  that  he  spake  (ver.  7)  ? 
Does  he  not  plainly  say  that  the  things  ' '  which 
God  prepared  for  those  that  love  Him,"  His 
purposes  of  mercy  and  counsels  of  love,  were 
revealed  to  him  by  God  through  the  agency 
of  the  Spirit  (ver.  10)  ?  and  does  he  not  en- 
hance his  declaration  not  only  by  affirmatively 
stating  from  whom  his  teaching  was  directly 
imparted,  but  by  stating,  on  the  negative  side, 
that  to  man's  wisdom  he  owed  it  not  ?  Yea, 
and  lest  it  should  be  thought  that  such  high 
prerogatives  belonged  only  to  words  spoken 
by  the  lips,  does  not  the  same  Apostle  guard 
himself,  as  it  were,  by  claiming  for  his  written 
words  an  origin  equally  Divine  ?  and  does  he 
not  make  the  recognition  of  this  a  very  test  of 
illumination  and  spirituality  (1  Cor.  xiv.  37). 
We  pause,  not  from  lack  of  further  state- 
ments, but  from  the  feeling  that  quite  enough 
has  been  said  to  lead  any  fair  reader  to  pro- 


148    8CRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

nounce  the  assertion  of  there  being ''  no  foun- 
dation" in  the  Gospels  or  Epistles  for  any  of 
the  higher  or  supernatural  views  of  inspiration 
contrary  to  evidence,  and  perhaps  even  to  ad- 
mit that  such  assertions,  where  ignorance  can- 
not be  pleaded  in  extenuation,  are  not  to  be 
deemed  consistent  with  fair  and  creditable 
argument.  To  deny  the  worth  or  validity  of 
such  testimony  is  perfectly  compatible  with 
fair  controversy  ;  to  deny  its  existence  in  the 
teeth  of  such  evidence, — and  such  evidence  is 
known  and  patent, — can  only  be  designed  to 
give  a  bias  to  a  reader,  and  to  raise  up  ante- 
cedent 2)rejudices  in  reference  to  subjects  and 
opinions  afterwards  to  be  introduced.  How 
far  such  a  mode  of  dealing  w^ith  grave  ques- 
tions is  just  or  defensible,  we  will  leave  others 
to  decide. 

Let  us  make  a  second  remark  of  a  somewhat 
similar  character,  and  earnestly  protest  against 
hazy  and  indefinite  modes  of  speaking  about 
the  testimony  of  the  Church  in  reference  to 
the  doctrine  of  inspiration.  Whether  the 
Church  is  right  or  wrong  in  its  estimate  of 
the  nature  and  limits  of  this  gift,  is  certainly 
a  question  which  those  who  feel  the  necessity 
of  inquiry  are  perfectly  at  liberty  to  entertain. 
We  may  pity  a  state  of  mind  that  is  not  moved 


SCRIPTURE :  ITS  INTERPRETA  TION.     149 

by  sncli  autli(jrity,  and  we  may  suspect  it  to  be 
ill-balanced  ;  but  we  do  not  complain  of  such 
a  mode  of  proceeding.  If  a  man  wishes  to  find 
out  whether  the  Early  Church,  for  instance,  is 
right  or  wrong  in  its  estimate  of  a  principle  or 
a  doctrine,  let  him  (in  a  serious  and  anxious 
spirit)  commence  his  investigation,  bat  let  him 
not  seek  by  vague  and  indefinite  language 
to  make  it  first  doubtful  whether  the  Early 
Church  really  did  form  any  estimate  at  all, — 
when  that  estimate  is  plainly  set  down  in  black 
and  white  in  fifty  different  treatises.  Let  us, 
at  any  rate,  have  a  clear  understanding  on  the 
question  at  issue,  and  agree  as  honest  men  to 
throw  no  doubts  upon  simple  matters  of  sim- 
plest fact.  IS^ow^,  when  we  are  told  that  the 
term  inspiration  is  l>ut  of  yesterday,  and  more 
especially  that  the  question  of  inspiration  was 
not  determined  by  Fathers  of  the  Church,  we 
do  seem  justified  in  protesting  against  such 
really  unfair  attempts  to  gain  over  those  who 
have  neither  the  time,  the  knowledge,  nor  per- 
haps the  will,  to  test  the  truth  of  the  assertion. 
Let  there  be  no  mistake  on  this  subject.  The 
Fathers  of  the  Church  may  be  right  or  they 
may  be  wrong  ;  but,  at  any  rate,  on  this  topic 
they  have  spoken  most  frequently  and  most 
plainly,  and  if  any  question  in  the  world  may 


150    SCRIP TURE :    ITS  INTERPRETA  TION. 

be  considered  determined  by  them  this  cer- 
tainly is  one.  The  Apostohcal  Fathers  term 
the  Scriptures  "  the  true  sayings"  of  the  Holy 
Ghost  (Clem.  Rom.  ad  Cor.  i.  45).  In  quot- 
ing passages  from  the  Old  Testament  they 
often  use  the  significant  formula  ' '  the  Holy 
Ghost  saith. "  Those  that  followed  them  used 
their  language.  Justin  Martyr  describes  the 
nature  of  inspiration,  and  even  hints  at  its 
limits  {Cohort.  §  8)  ;  Irenaeus  speaks  of  the 
Scriptures  as  "  spoken  by  the  Word  of  God 
and  His  Spirit"  {IlcBr.  ii.  28.  2)  ;  and  even  at- 
tributes to  the  foresight  of  the  Eternal  Spirit 
the  choice  of  this  rather  than  that  mode  of  ex- 
pression in  the  opening  words  of  St.  Matthew's 
Gospel  {II(m\  iii.  16.  2).  In  quoting  a  prophet, 
Clement  of  Alexandria  pauses  to  correct  him- 
self, and  say  it  was  not  so  much  the  prophet 
as  the  Holy  Spirit  in  him  {Cohort.  §  8,  p.  QQ), 
and  on  the  question  of  Scripture  infallibility 
and  perfection  he  is  no  less  precise  and  definite 
{Cohort.  §  9,  p.  68  ;  Strom,  ii.  p.  432,  vii.  p. 
897,  ed.  Potter).  Tertullian  and  Cyprian  carry 
onward  the  common  sentiment  ;  those  who 
follow  them  reiterate  the  same  so  frequently 
and  so  definitively  that  we  become  embarrassed 
by  the  very  affluence  of  our  examples.  Euse- 
bius  of  Cassarea  deals  even  with  technicalities, 


SCRIPTURE:   ITS  INr?JRPRETATION.    151 

and  brands  those  who  dared  to  saj  that  the 
writers  of  Scripture  put  one  name  in  the  place 
of  anotlier  {Comment,  in  Psalm,  xxxiii.,  ed. 
Montf.).  Angustine  states  most  explicitly  his 
views  on  the  whole  subject,  and  asserts  the  in- 
fallibility of  Scripture  in  language  which  the 
strongest  asserter  of  the  so-called  bibliolatry  of 
the  day  could  not  desire  to  see  made  more  de- 
finite or  unqualified  (see  for  example  Epist. 
Ixxxii.  3,  to'in.  ii.  p.  285,  ed.  Bened.  2).  .  .  . 
Again  we  pause.  AV^e  could  continue  such 
quotations  almost  indefinitely.  We  could  put 
our  fingers  positively  on  hundreds  of  such  pas- 
sages in  the  writings  of  the  Fathers  of  the  first 
five  or  six  centuries  ;  we  could  quote  the  lan- 
guage of  early  Councils  ;  we  could  point  to 
the  silent  testimony  of  early  controversies, 
each  side  claiming  Scripture  to  be  that  from 
which  there  could  be  no  appeal ;  we  could  even 
call  in  heretics,  and  prove  from  their  own 
defences  of  their  own  tenets,  from  their  own 
admissions  and  their  own  assumptions,  that  the 
inspiration  of  Scripture  was  of  all  subjects  one 
that  was  conceived  thorouffhly  settled  and 
agreed  upon.  Enough,  however,  has  pei'haps 
been  said,  enough  quoted,  to  place  the  matter 
beyond  doul)t,  and  to  make  this  perfectly  cer- 
tain,— that  what  are  called  high  views  of  inspi- 


152    SCRIP  TUBE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

ration  were  entertained  almost  unanimously  hj 
the  earlier  writers  of  the  Church.  So  obvious, 
indeed,  is  the  fact  that  writers  like  Gfrorer 
not  only  concede  the  fact  of  the  agreement  of 
the  early  writers,  and  admit  the  strong  opin- 
ions they  held  on  the  subject,  but  use  it  as  a 
very  ground  of  reproacli  against  them,  and 
call  upon  us  to  wonder  how  men  who  enter- 
tained such  high  views  on  the  inspiration  of 
Scripture  could  j)ossibly  be  such  arbitrary  and 
unfaithful  interpreters. 

A  third  remark  may  be  made  on  the  nega- 
ti\^e  side  by  way  of  complaint  that  we  find  so 
little  weight  assigned  to  the  subjective  argu- 
ment, as  it  may  be  termed,  for  the  inspiration 
of  Scripture.  In  the  sceptical  writings  of  the 
day  the  argument  is  rarely  stated  except  to  be 
dealt  with  as  a  form  of  a  natural  but  not  very 
harmless  illusion.  Yet  it  is  an  argument  of 
the  greatest  force  and  importance,  and  an  ar- 
gument which,  if  rightly  handled,  it  is  much 
easier  to  set  aside  than  to  answer.  Is  it  noth- 
ing that  the  Bible  has  spoken  to  millions  upon 
millions  of  hearts,  as  it  were  with  the  very 
voice  of  God  Himself  ?  Have  not  its  words 
burned  within  till  men  have  seen  palpably  the 
Divine  in  that  which  spake  to  them  ?  Is  it 
not  a  fact  that  convictions  on  the  nature  of 


SCRIPTURE:    ITS  INTERPRETATION.    153 

the  Scriptures  deepen  with  deepening  study 
of  them  ?  Ask  the  simple  man  to  wlioni  the 
Bible  has  long  become  the  daily  friend  and 
counsellor,  who  reads  and  applies  what  he 
reads  as  far  as  his  natural  powers  enable  him  ; 
ask  him  whether  longer  and  more  continued 
study  has  altered  to  any  extent  his  estimate  of 
the  Book  as  a  Divine  revelation.  What  is  the 
invariable  answer  ?  The  Book  ' '  has  found 
him  ;"  it  has  consoled  him  in  sorrows  for 
which  there  seemed  no  consolation  on  this 
side  the  grave  ;  it  has  wiped  aw^ay  tears  that  it 
seemed  could  only  be  wiped  away  in  that  far 
land  where  sadness  shall  be  no  more  ;  it  has 
pleaded  gently  during  long  seasons  of  spiritual 
coldness  ;  it  has  infused  strength  in  hours  of 
weakness  ;  it  has  calmed  in  moments  of  excite- 
ment ;  .it  has  given  to  better  emotions  a  per- 
manence, and  to  stirred-up  feelings  a  reality  ; 
it  has  made  itself  felt  to  be  wliat  it  is  ;  out  of 
the  abundance  of  his  heart  the  mouth  speaks, 
and  he  tells  us  with  all  the  accumulated  con- 
victions of  an  honest  mind,  that  if  he  once 
deemed  the  Bible  to  be  fully  inspired  on  the 
testimonv  of  others,  now  he  knows  it  on  evi- 
dence  that  has  been  brought  home  to  his  own 
soul.      He  has  now  long  had  the  witness  in 


154    SCRIPTURE :    ITS  INTERPRETA TION, 

himself,  and  that  witness  he  feels  and  knows 
is  unchangeably  and  endnringly  true. 

Ask,  again,  the  professed  student  of  Scrip- 
ture, the  scholar,  the  divine,  the  interpreter, 
one  who,  to  what  we  may  term  the  testimony 
of  the  soul,  in  the  case  of  the  less  cultivated 
reader,  can  add  the  testimony  of  the  mind  and 
the  spirit,— ask  such  a  one  whether  increased 
familiarity  with  Sci'ipture  has  quickened  or 
obscured  his  perception  of  the  Divine  within 
it,  wiiether  it  has  led  him  to  higher  or  to  lower 
views  of  inspiration.  Have  not,  we  may  j)er- 
haps  anxiously  ask,  the  difficulties  of  Scripture 
wearied  him,  its  seeming  discordances  per- 
plexed, its  obscurities  depressed  him  ?  Have 
not  the  tenor  of  its  arguments,  and  the  seeming 
w^ant  of  coherence  and  connexion  in  adjacent 
sentences,  sometimes  aw^akened  uneasy  and 
disquieting  thoughts  ?  What  is  ahnost  inva- 
riably the  answer? — "No;  far  otherwise." 
Deepened  study  has  brought  its  blessing  and 
its  balm.  It  has  shown  how  what  might  seem 
the  greatest  difficulties  often  turn  merely 
upon  our  ignorance  of  one  or  two  unrecorded 
facts  or  relations  ;  it  has  conducted  to  stand- 
ing-points where  in  a  moment  all  that  has 
hitherto  seemed  confused  and  distorted  has 
arranged  itself  in  truest  symmetry  and  in  the 


SCRIPTURE:   ITS  INTERPRETATION.    155 

fairest  persjiective.     In  many  an  obscure  pas- 
sage our  student  will  tell  us  how  tlie  light  has 
ofttimes  suddenly  broken,   how  he   has  been 
cheered  by  being  permitted  to  recognize  and 
identify  tlie  commingling  of  human  weakness 
and  Divine  power,  the  mighty  revelation  al- 
most   too    great    for    mortal    utterance,    the 
<'  earthen  vessel  "  almost  parting  asunder  from 
the  greatness  and  abundance  of  the  heavenly 
treasure  committed  to  it.      He  will  tell  us, 
again,  how  in  many  a  portion  where  the  logi- 
cal connexion  has  seemed  suspended  or  doubt- 
ful,— in  one  of  those  discourses,  for  instance, 
of  his  Lord    as   recorded   by    St.  John, — the 
true  connexion  has  at  length  slowly  and  mys- 
teriously disclosed  itself,  how  he  has  perceived  . 
and  reahzed  all.     For  a  while  he  has  felt  him- 
self  thinking   as   his   Saviour   vouchsafed   to 
think,   in  part  beholding  truth    as  those  Di- 
vine eyes  beheld  it ;  for  a  brief  space  his  mind 
has  seemed   to  be  consciously  one  with  the 
mind  of  Christ.    All  this  he  has  perceived  and 
felt.     And  lie   will  tell   us,   perchance,   what 
has  often  been  the  sequel  ;  how  he  has  risen 
from   his  desk  and  fallen  on  his  knees,   and 
with   uplifted   voice    l)lessed    and   adored  A1-- 
miirhtv  God  for  His  mft  of  the  Book  of  Life. 
The  cold-heai-ted  may  smile  at  such  things. 


V- 


156    SCRIPTURE:    ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

the  so-called  philosophical  may  affect  to  ac- 
count for  them  ;  they  may  be  put  aside  as  il- 
lusions, or  they  may  be  explained  away  as 
projections  of  self  on  the  passive  page,  uncon- 
scious infusion  of  one's  own  feelings  and  emo- 
tions in  the  calm  words  that  meet  the  outward 
eye.  All  this  has  been  urged  against  such 
testimony,  and  will  ever  be  urged  even  to 
the  very  end.  But  when  the  end  does  come 
the  truth  will  appear.  That  witnessing  of 
soul  and  spirit  will,  it  may  be,  rise  up  in  silent 
judgment  against  many  a  one  who  now  slights 
it  ;  that  testimony  so  often  rejected  as  self- 
engendered  and  fanciful,  will  be  seen  to  have 
been  real  and  heaven-born,  a  reflex  image  of 
an  eternal  truth,  a  part  and  a  portion  of  the 
surest  of  the  sure  things  of  God. 

9.  But  let  us  now  pass  from  the  negative  to 
the  positive,  and  make  a  few  affirmative  obser- 
vations on  the  subject  before  us.  Let  us  begin, 
not  with  a  theory,  but  with  a  definition  and  a 
statement  of  the  belief  that  is  in  us.  If  asked 
to  define  what  we  mean  l)y  the  inspiration  of 
Scripture,  let  us  be  bold,  and  make  answer — 
that  fully  convinced  as  we  are  that  the  Scrip- 
•ture  is  the  revelation  through  human  media  of 
the  infinite  mind  of  God  to  the  finite  mind  of 
man,  and  recognizing  as  we  do  both  a  human 


SCRIPTURE:    ITS  INTERPRETATION.    157 

and  a  Divine  element  in  the  written  Word,  we 
verily  believe  that  the  Holy  Ghost  was  so 
breathed  into  the  mind  of  the  writer,  so  illu- 
mined his  spirit  and  pervaded  his  thoughts, 
that,  Avhile  nothing  tliat  individualized  him  as 
man  was  taken  away,  everything  that  was  neces- 
sary to  enable  him  to  declare  Divine  Truth  in 
all  its  fulness  was  bestowed  and  superadded. 
And,  as  consonant  with  this,  we  further  be- 
lieve that  this  influence  of  the  Spirit,  whether 
by  illumination,  suggestion,  superintendence, 
or  all  combined,  extended  itself — -fir.n,  to  the 
enunciation  of  sentiments  and  doctrines,  that 
so  the  will  and  counsels  of  God  should  not  be 
a  matter  of  doubt,  but  of  certain  knowledge  ; 
secondly,  to  statements,  recitals,  facts,  that  so 
the  truth  into  which  the  writer  was  led  should 
be  known  and  recognized  ;  thirdly,  to  the 
choice  of  expressions,  modes  of  speech,  and 
perhaps  occasionally  even  of  words  (the  in- 
dividuality of  the  writer  being  conserved), 
that  so  the  subject-matter  of  tlie  revelation 
might  1)0  conveyed  in  the  Attest  and  most  ap- 
propriate language,  and  in  the  garb  best  calcu- 
lated to  set  off  its  dignity  and  commend  its 
truth. 

Let  such  be  our  deflnition.     If  asked  how 
we  justify  it,  how  we  prove*our  assertions,  we 


158    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTEUPRETATION, 

answer  in  two  ways  :  first,  by  d\j)riori  argu- 
ments of  great  force  and  validity  ;  secondly, 
by  d  posteriori  arguments  of  equal  or  even 
greater  strength — arguments  wliicli  our  pre- 
ceding remarks  on  the  negative  side  have  been 
designed  indirectly  to  set  forward  and  substan- 
tiate. Into  these  arguments  we  do  not  in- 
tend to  enter,  but  we  may  profitably  pause  to 
specify  them.  On  the  a  priori  side,  and  es- 
pecially in  reference  to  the  Old  Testament,  we 
may  specify  evidences  of  inspiration  derived 
from  the  clear  accordance  of  various  events 
with  prophecies  special  or  general  that  can 
be  proved  to  have  been  uttered  before  the 
events  in  question.  Among  instances  of  this 
nature  the  history  and  present  state  of  the 
Jews  have  been  always  rightly  and  confidently 
appealed  to.^  Again,  on  the  same  side,  but 
more  in  reference  to  the  New  Testament,  it 
has  been  fairl}'  urged  that,  if  we  admit  the 
general  truth  and  Divine  character  of  the 
Christian  dispensation,  we  can  hardly  believe 
that  those  who  were  chosen  to  declare  its  prin- 
jsiples  and  to  make  known  its  doctrines  were 
not  especially  guarded  from  error  in  the  exe- 
cution of  their  weighty  commission,  and  were 

!    *  See  Moberly,  Preface    to   '  Sermons  on   the  Beati- 
tudes,' p.  xxxii.         • 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    159 

not  divinely  guided  both  in  the  words  they 
nttered  and  the  statements  they  committed  to 
writing.  On  tlie  a  posteriori  side  we  may 
specify  the  tliree  great  arguments  to  which  we 
have  ah-eady  aUuded  :  the  direct  declarations 
of  Scripture,  the  trustworthy  character  of 
Scripture  having  been  first  demonstrated  ;* 
the  unanimous  consent  of  the  early  writers, 
and  unchanging  testimony  of  the  Catholic 
Church  ;  and,  lastly,  the  inward  and  subjec- 
tive testimony  to  the  Divine  nature  of  the 
Scripture  yielded  by  the  soul  and  spirit  of  the 
individual.  Other  arguments  there  are,  es- 
pecially on  the  a  'priori  side,  of  varying  de- 
grees of  strength  and  solidity,  appealing  in 
different  ways  to  different  minds  ;  but  the 
chief  perhaps  have  been  specified,  and  on  these 
we  may  safely  and  securely  base  our  preceding 
assertions,  and  our  unhesitating  and  unqual- 
ified belief  in  the  full  inspiration  of  the  Word 
of  God. 

But  it  may  be  asked,  how  do  we  conceive 
that  this  inspiration  took  place  ?     What  is  our 

*  Thus  to  appeal  to  Scripture  to  define  its  o^^  n  charac- 
ter in  reference  to  inspiration  seems  perfectly  fair,  when 
the  trustworthy  character  of  the  volume  has  been  prop- 
erly demonstrated  ;  compare  the  remarks  of  Chalmers, 
'  Christian  Evidences,'  iv.  2.  26,  vol.  iv.,  p.  390.  (Glas- 
gow ed.) 


160    SCRIPTURE:   ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

theory  of  the  process  ?  what  do  we  conceive  to 
be  the  modus  agendi  of  the  Holy  Spirit  in  the 
heart  of  man  ?  This  we  plainly  refuse  to  an- 
swer. We  know  not,  and  do  not  presume  to 
inquire  into  the  manner  ;  we  recognize  and  be- 
lieve in  the  fact.  Individual  writers  may  have 
speculated  ;  imagery,  suitable  or  unsuitable, 
may  have  been  introduced  as  illustrative  by  a 
few  thinkers  in  early  ages  ;  but  the  Cathohc 
Church  has  never  put  forward  a  theory.  On 
this  subject  she  has  always  maintained  a  sol- 
emn reserve  ;  she  declares  to  us  that  in  the 
Scripture  the  Holy  Ghost  speaks  to  us  by  the 
mouths  of  men  ;  she  permits  us  to  recognize 
a  Divine  and  a  human  element  ;  but,  in  ref- 
erence to  the  nature,  extent,  and  special  cir- 
cumstances of  the  union,  she  warns  us  not  to 
seek  to  be  wise  above  what  has  been  written, 
•not  to  endanger  our  faith  with  sj)eculations 
and  conjectures  about  that  which  has  not  been 
revealed.  Theories  of  inspiration  are  what 
scepticism  is  ever  craving  for  ;  it  is  the  voice 
of  hapless  unbelief  that  is  ever  loudest  in  its 
call  for  explanation  of  the  manner  of  the  as- 
sumed union  of  the  Divine  with  the  human, 
or  of  the  proportions  in  which  each  element  is 
to  be  admitted  and  recognized.  Such  explana- 
tions have  not  been  vouchsafed,  and  it  is  as  vain 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    161 

and  unbecoming  to  demand  them  as  it  is  to  re- 
quire a  theory  of  the  union  of  the  Divinity  and 
Humanity  in  the  person  of  Christ,  or  an  esti- 
mate of  the  proportions  in  which  tlie  two  per- 
fect natures  are  to  be  conceived  to  co-exist. 

Not  much  more  profitable  is  the  inquiry 
into  the  exact  Hmits  of  inspiration,  whether  it 
is  to  be  considered  in  all  cases  as  extending  to 
words,  or  whether  it  is  only  to  be  confined  to 
sentiments  and  doctrines.  At  first  sight  we 
might  be  inclined  to  adopt  the  latter  statement, 
and  such,  to  some  extent,  would  certainly 
seem  to  have  been  the  view  of  a  writer  of  no 
less  antiquity  and  learning  than  Justin  Martyr  ; 
still  when  we  remember,  on  the  one  hand,  that 
there  are  instances  in  Scripture  in  which 
weighty  arguments  have  in  some  degree  been 
seen  to  depend  on  the  very  words  and  expres- 
sions that  are  made  use  of  (John  x.  34  ;  Gal. 
iii.  16),  and  on  the  other,  that  many  im- 
portant truths  must  have  lost  much  of  their 
force  and  significance  if  they  had  not  been 
expressed  exactly  with  that  verbal  precision 
which  the  subject-matter  might  have  de- 
manded, we  shall  be  wise  either  to  forbear 
coming  to  any  decision,  or  else  to  adopt  that 
guarded  view  which  we  have  already  indii*ectly 
advocated,  viz.,  that  in  all  passages  of  impor- 
11 


162    SCMIPTUBE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

tance,  wheresoever  the  natural  powers  of  the 
writer  would  not  have  supplied  the  befitting 
word,  or  expression,  there  it  was  supplied  by 
the  real  though  probably  unperceived  influence 
of  the  Spirit  of  God. 

A  question  of  far  greater  moment,  and  far 
more  practical  importance,  is  that  which  re- 
lates to  the  exact  degree  of  the  inspiration,  the 
fallibility  or  infallibility  of  the  Sacred  Rec- 
ords. Was  the  inspiration  such  as  wholly  to 
preclude  errors  and  inaccuracies,  or  was  it 
such  as  can  be  compatible  with  either  one  or 
the  other  ?  This  is  clearly  the  real  anxious 
question  of  om-  own  times,  and  one  to  which 
we  must  briefly  return  an  answer,  as  general 
canons  of  interpretation  must  obviously  to 
some  extent  be  modified  by  the  opinions  we 
form  on  a  subject  which  so  seriously  affects 
the  character  of  the  documents  before  us.  Let 
us  pause  for  a  moment  to  consider  the  answer 
that  is  now  commonly  returned  by  those  among 
us  who  claim  be  considered  of  advanced 
thought  and  intelligence.  They  tell  us,  in  lan- 
guage of  unrestrained  confidence,  that  no  man 
of  candor  can  fail  to  acknowledge  the  exist- 
ence not  only  of  mistakes  as  to  matters  of  minor 
importance,  but  of  such  positive  ' '  patches  of 
human  passion  and  error,"  such  ''  weakness  of 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    163 

memory,"  or  such  '^  mingling  of  it  with  im- 
agination," such  ''  feebleness  of  inference,  such 
confusion  of  illustration  with  argument,"  and 
such  variations  in  judgment  and  opinion,  that 
in  the  study  of  Scripture  we  must  continually 
have  recourse  to  a  ^'  rectifying  or  verifying 
faculty, ' '  that  we  may  pro23erly  be  enabled  to 
separate  the  Divine  from  the  human, — what 
is  true,  real,  and  unprejudiced,  from  what  is 
perverted,  mistaken,  and  false.  In  a  word, 
the  Sacred  writers  now  stand  charged  with  er- 
rors of  two  kinds, — errors  of  mind  and  judg- 
ment, and  errors  in  matters  of  fact,  l)ut  on  evi- 
dence (as  the  following  remarks  will  tend  to 
show)  which  cannot  be  regarded  either  as  suffi- 
cient or  conclusive. 

To  substantiate  the  first  class  of  errors  we 
may  commonly  observe  two  modes  of  pro- 
ceeding :  on  the  one  hand,  the  more  reckless 
method  of  citing  difficult  texts,  assuming  that 
they  contain  a  meaning  arbitrarily  fixed  on  by 
the  critic,  and  probably  not  intended  by  the 
writer,  and  then  censuring  him  for  not  having 
intelligibly  expressed  it  ;  on  the  other  hand, 
the  more  guarded  but  equally  mischievous  sug- 
gestion that  the  logic  of  tlie  Scriptures  is  rhe- 
torical in  character,  and  tliat  sucli  passages  as 
Rom.   i.    16  seii.^   Rom.    iii.    L'J,   al.,   are    ex- 


164     SCRIPTURE:  IT8  INTERPRETATION. 

amples  of  some  forms  of  error  in  reasonings 
and  such  oppositions  as  ' '  light  and  darkness, ' ' 
''  good  and  evil,"  "  the  Spirit  and  the  flesh," 
' '  the  sheep  and  the  goats, ' '  oppositions  of 
ideas  only,  which  are  not  realized  in  fact  and 
experience.  With  regard  to  these  methods, 
we  will  say  briefly  that  the  first  is  unfair  and 
discreditable  ;  the  second,  simple  assertion 
that  can  either  be  disproved  in  detail,  or  that 
fairly  admits  of  counter-assertion  of  greater 
probable  truth. 

The  second  class  of  alleged  errors  is,  at  first 
sight,  of  more  importance  and  plausibility.  It 
professes  to  include  oppositions  to  science, 
oppositions  to  received  history,  and  cases  of 
direct  mutual  contradiction.  Of  these  three 
forms  we  may  again  briefly  say  that  instances 
of  the  first  kind,  far  from  increasing,  are  stead- 
ily decreasing  under  a  just  comparison  of  the 
true  meaning  of  the  words  of  Scripture  with  the 
accredited  conclusions  of  science.  Eecent  dis- 
cussions of  the  subjects  of  controversy  by  men 
of  acknowledged  scientific  attainments  have 
tended  to  show  that  the  oppositions  of  Scrip- 
ture and  science  are  really  far  more  doubtful 
than  they  are  assumed  to  be,  and  that  though 
they  still  hold  a  very  prominent  place  on  the 
pages  of  the  charlatan,  they  one  by  one  dis- 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATIOI^.     165 

appear  from  the  treatises  of  men  of  real  science 
who  liave  scholarship  sufficient  to  extract  the 
real  meaning  of  the  language  of  Scripture  in 
the  passages  under  consideration.  .  .  .  Much 
the  same  sort  of  remark,  iivutatls  mutandis^ 
may  be  made  on  alleged  oppositions  to  received 
History  or  Chronology  ;  many  of  the  sup- 
posed oppositions  held  in  former  times  to  be 
inexplicable  have  now  entirely  passed  away 
from  the  scene,  and  have  alike  ceased  to  stimu- 
late the  sceptic  or  to  disquiet  the  believer  ; 
others,  like  the  case  of  Cyrenius  (Luke  ii.  2), 
are  all  but  gone  ;  and  as  to  what  remain  there 
is  a  growing  feeling  among  unbiassed  scholars 
and  historians  that  if  we  could  but  obtain  the 
knowledge  of  a  few  more  facts  relative  to 
the  various  points  at  issue,  the  oppositions  of 
Scripture  and  History  would  wholly  cease  to 
«xist.  ...  In  regard  of  mutual  contradic- 
tions, it  might  be  thought  a  better  case  has 
been  made  out.  Writers  from  wliom  we  might 
have  looked  for  more  guarded  comment  have 
done  much  to  exaggerate  the  so-called  discrep- 
ancies of  the  Scripture  narrative,  and  have 
somewhat  too  emphatically  denounced  modes 
of  explanation  that,  both  from  their  simplicity 
and,  not  unfrequently,  their  antiquity,  have 
very  great  claims  on  our  consideration.     Seep- 


166    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION. 

tics  have  not  been  slow  to  take  advantage  of 
this  ill-advised  course.  When,  however,  all 
these  so-called  contradictions  are  mustered  upy 
they  are  but  a  motley  and  an  enfeebled  host. 
We  survey  them,  and  we  observe  some  as  old 
as  the  days  of  Celsus,  and  as  decrepit  as  they 
are  old  ;  others  vainly  hiding  all  but  mortal 
wounds  received  in  conflicts  of  the  past,  and 
now  only  craving  a  coicp  de  grace  from  some 
combatant  of  our  own  times  ;  some  of  a  later 
date,  and  a  more  aspiring  air,  recruited  from 
Deistical  controversies  of  a  century  or  two^ 
back,  but  all  marked  with  uncomely  scars^ 
and  armed  with  nothing  better  than  broken  or 
corroded  weapons.  There  they  stand  ;  the  dis- 
crepancy between  two  Evangelists  about  the 
original  dwelling-place  of  Mary  and  Joseph, 
explained  and  well  explained  fourteen  hundred 
years  ago  ;  the  two  genealogies,  fairly  dis- 
cussed in  ancient  times,  and  in  our  own  ex- 
plained in  a  manner  that  approaches  to  positive 
demonstration  ;  the  blasphemy  of  the  two 
thieves,  disposed  of  very  reasonably  by  Chry- 
sostom,  and  since  his  time  on  the  same  or  a 
similar  princij)le  by  every  unprejudiced  com- 
mentator ;  the  narrative  of  the  woman  who 
anointed  our  Lord's  feet,  first  jDrepared  for  the 
occasion  by  the  assumption  that  the  narratives 


SCRIPTURE :  ITS  INTERPRETA  TION.     1  < j 7 

in  all  the  four  Gospels  relate  to  the  same 
woman, — an  assumption  regarded  even  by 
Meyer,  and  apparently  De  Wette,  as  plainly 
contrary  to  the  fact.  And  so  on.  When  we 
survey  such  a  company,  and  are  told  that,  at 
any  rate,  we  should  respect  their  numbers, 
their  aggregate  authority,  their  cumulative 
weight,  an  uneasy  feeling  arises  in  the  mind 
that  those  who  parade  them  must  really  be 
aware  that  there  is  something  amiss  with  each 
case,  that,  however  numerically  strong  they 
may  be,  it  is  disagreeably  true  that  as  individual 
instances  they  are  disabled  or  weak.  If  so,  is 
there  not  a  great  responsibility  resting  on  those 
who  bring  forward  catalogues  of  such  in- 
stances, and  yet  do  not  apprise  the  simple  and 
the  inexperienced  that  each  supposed  dilfi- 
culty  has  most  certainly  been  met  over  and 
over  again,  and  with  very  reasonable  success  ; 
that  this  array,  so  to  be  respected  for  its  num- 
bers, is  really  strong  in  nothing  else, — a  mere 
rabble  of  half -armed  or  disarmed  men  ? 

But  finally,  it  may  be  said,  are  we  prepared 
to  assert  that  no  inaccuracy,  even  in  what  all 
might  agree  in  regarding  as  a  wholly  unim- 
portant matter  of  fact, — a  date,  for  instance, 
or  a  name,  or  a  popular  statement  of  an  in- 
diiferent  matter, — either  has  been,  or  can  ever 


1 68     SCRIPTURE :  ITS  INTERPRETA TION. 

be,  found  in  the  whole  compass  of  Scripture  ? 
To  that  question,  in  its  categorical  form,  we 
should  perhaps  be  wise  in  refusing  positively 
to  return  any  answer.  We  have  no  theory 
of  inspiration,  we  only  state  what  we  find  to 
be  a  matter  of  fact,  we  only  put  forward  what 
those  facts  and  the  testimony  of  the  Church 
alike  warrant  us  in  defining  as  the  true  and 
Catholic  doctrine.  We  have  no  means  of  set- 
tling definitely  whether  a  j^osse  .peccare  in 
minor  matters  may,  or  may  not,  be  compati- 
ble with  a  Divine  revelation  communicated 
through  human  media  ;  but  certainly  till  inac- 
curacies, fairly  and  incontestably  proved  to 
be  so,  are  brought  home  to  the  Scripture,  we 
seem  logically  justified  in  believing  that  as  it 
is  with  nine-tenths  of  the  alleged  contradictions 
in  Scripture,  so  is  it  with  the  alleged  inaccu- 
racy. Either  the  so-called  inaccuracy  is  due  to 
our  ignorance  of  some  simple  fact,  which,  if 
known,  would  explain  all  ;  or  it  is  really  only 
an  illustration  of  one  of  those  very  conditions 
and  characteristics  of  human  testimony,  how- 
ever honest  and  truthful,  without  which  it 
would  cease  to  be  hmnan  testimony  at  all.  If 
positively  forced  to  state  our  opinion,  we  will 
express  what  we  believe  to  be  the  true  doctrine 
of  inspiration  in  this  particular  by  an  example 


SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTERPRETATION.    169 

• 
and  a  simile.     As  in  the  case  of  the  Incarnate 

Word  we  fully  recognize  in  the  Lord's  hu- 
manity all  essentially  human  limitations  and 
weaknesses,  the  hunger,  the  thirst,  and  the 
weariness  on  the  side  of  the  body,  and  the 
gradual  development  on  the  side  of  the  human 
mind  (Luke  ii.  40), — in  a  word,  all  that  be- 
longs to  the  essential  and  original  characteris- 
tics of  the  pure  form  of  the  nature  He  voach- 
safed  to  assume,  but  plainly  deny  the  exist- 
ence therein  of  the  faintest  trace  of  sin,  or  of 
moral  or  mental  imperfection, — even  so  in  the 
case  of  the  written  Word,  viewed  on  its  purely 
human  side,  cm,d  in  its  reference  to  incutters 
previously  admitted  to  have  no  l)earing  on 
Divine  truth,  we  may  admit  therein  the  ex- 
istence of  such  incompleteness,  such  limita- 
tions, and  such  imperfections  as  belong  even 
to  the  highest  foi*ms  of  purely  truthful  human 
testimony,  but  consistently  deny  the  existence 
of  mistaken  views,  perversion,  misrepresenta- 
tion, and  any  form  whatever  of  consciously 
committed  error  or  inaccuracy. 

10.  We  have  thus  at  length  touched  upon 
all  the  main  points  in  which  the  doctrine  of 
the  inspiration  of  Scripture  is  in  any  degree 
likely  to  come  in  contact  with  rules  and  prin- 
ciples of  interpretation.     Less  than  this  could 


170    SCRIPTURE:  ITS  INTEUPRETATION. 

• 
not  have  been  said.     Less  it  was  not  logically 

consistent  to  say.  It  may,  indeed,  seem  plau- 
sible to  urge  that  we  have  no  right  to  express 
any  prior  opinion  on  such  subject ;  that  we 
have  only  to  apply  to  Scripture  the  ordinary 
rules  of  inter j)retation  which  we  observe  in  the 
case  of  other  books,  and  that  we  ought  to 
leave  the  question  of  insj)iration  to  be  settled 
by  the  results  we  arrive  at.  Is  it  not,  how- 
ever, abundantly  clear  that  if  thfere  be  even  a 
low  presumption,  arising  from  external  or  in- 
ternal evidence,  for  supposing  that  the  Scrip- 
ture has  characteristics  which  render  it  very 
unlike  any  other  book,  then  it  is  only  right  and 
reasonable  to  examine  that  evidence  before 
we  ap23ly  rules  of  interpretation  which,  per- 
haps, may  l)e  found  in  the  sequel  to  be  inad- 
missible or  inapplicable  ?  Surely,  on  the  very 
face  of  the  matter  it  seems  somewhat  strange 
to  be  told  to  interpret  the  Scripture  like  any 
other  book,  while  in  the  same  breath  it  is 
avowed  that  there  are  many  respects  in  which 
Scripture  is  unlike  any  other  book.  It  is 
really  y^y^  much  the  same  as  being  told  to  as- 
certain with  a  two-foot  rule  the  precise  linear 
dimensions  of  a  room  of  which  it  is  known  or 
admitted  that  the  sides  are  not  always  straight, 
but  variously  curved  and  embayed.     The  ap- 


SCMIPTURE :  ITS  INTERPRET  A  TION.    1 7 1 

plication  of  our  two-foot  rule  would  doubtless 
put  very  clearly  before  us,  if  we  had  ever 
doubted  it,  not  only  the  fact  that  bays  and 
curvatures  really  did  exist,  but  also  that  the 
instrument  in  our  hands  was  a  singularly  unfit 
one  for  measuring  what  it  was  plain  required 
something  less  rigid  and  impracticable.  The 
duty  of  the  two-foot  rule  would  really  then 
be  over,  unless  we  chose  to  reserve  it  for  those 
parts  where  the  walls  somewhat  more  nearly 
conformed  to  the  straight  line.  If,  however, 
we  desired  properly  to  complete  our  task,  we 
should  have  to  go  home  for  our  measuring- 
tape. 


h^h.,  }ul^    )H-y,  i^  !,  I  ^ 


-^ 


Date  Due 

1 

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mmmmm^^ 

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li 


BS480 .B88 

The  inspiration  of  Holy  Scripture 

Princeton  Theological  Seminary-Speer  Library 


1    1012  00050  9119 


lp<|\xtx\xvff 


